Brian J. Hall

Brian J. Hall, PhD is the Founding Director of the Center for Global Health Equity, a tenured Professor of Global Public Health at NYU Shanghai, and an Affiliated Professor at the Department of Global and Environmental Health, School of Global Public Health, New York University. Since 2014, Hall has been an associate faculty member in the Department of Health, Behavior and Society at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In 2024, Hall was invited as an Adjunct Professor at the Sun Yat-sen University School of Public Health.

Prof. Hall earned his PhD in Clinical Health Psychology from Kent State University. He completed his clinical internship at the Medical University of South Carolina as a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) T32 predoctoral traumatic stress fellow. He then specialized in epidemiological methods, public mental health, and global mental health during a two-year NIMH T32 Fellowship in Psychiatric Epidemiology in the Department of Mental Health, at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In 2013 he moved full-time to China to conduct research in infectious disease epidemiology and migrant health as the last NIH Fogarty Global Health Fellow in China, (UJMT Consortium; now the Leaders in Global Health Research Program (LAUNCH)), hosted by the University of North Carolina Institute of Global Health and Infectious Disease, UNC Project China, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and the Sun Yat-sen University School of Public Health and the China Medical Board funded Center for Migrant Health Policy.

In 2017 Hall was the inaugural Global Mental Health Fellow of the World Health Organization, where he co-developed the Cultural Sections of the ICD-11 Neurological and Psychiatric Conditions and participated in the formulation of the scalable mental health program launched by the WHO, including Step-by-Step, the WHO scalable digital mental health intervention. Hall led the cultural adaptation of the program for overseas Filipino workers and Chinese young adults and conducted the first implementation science trials of WHO interventions in Asia. Hall participated in the development of the WHO regional framework for mental health in the Western Pacific Region which was officially launched in 2023.

For more than a decade in China, Hall conducted epidemiologic investigations on the health of diverse populations. Hall led some of the first studies of the African community in Guangzhou China, exploring the influence of social networks on HIV and sexual health, mental health, and the influence of discrimination on wellbeing. His team conducted the first community collaborative large-scale mixed-methods studies of transnational Filipino and Indonesian domestic workers, examining the social determinants of diverse health outcomes, including sexual, cardiometabolic, social, and mental health. He is currently a co-PI on a $1.3 million dollar five-country study investigating barriers to mental health care for diverse migrant populations. As a recognized authority on mental health in China and the Western Pacific Region, Hall served as a Commissioner on the Lancet Commission for Mental Health in China, publishing the first review of China’s Mental Health and Psychosocial (MHPSS) response. Hall has hosted students in China from the United States and other countries, engaging them directly in community-based research. His dedication to global health mentoring was recognized by a Faculty Excellence in Advising Award, from the Center for Global Health, at the Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Hall is the recipient of seven research career awards, including the Chaim and Bela Danieli Young Professional Award, International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies, and the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest, and The Theodore Blau Early Career Award for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Clinical Psychology, Society of Clinical Psychology, Division 12 of the American Psychological Association. In 2019 he was elected as a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (D52: International & D12: Clinical), and in 2022, he was inducted into Delta Omega Honorary Society for Public Health.

Hall currently serves as a Senior Associate Editor, Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences. In 2024, he was elected as a Steering Committee Member, The Migration Health, and Development Research Initiative (MHADRI). Hall served as an elected Board Member (2017-2019) of the International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies. He continues to serve as mental health technical advisor on digital mental health to the WHO Western Pacific Regional Office, and has collaborated and consulted with numerous NGOs, iNGOs, and UN agencies including WHO, UNICEF, UNAIDS, and the World Bank, and the Asian Development Bank.

Hall is a prolific scholar, academic leader, and dedicated mentor, co-authoring more than 320 journal articles, chapters, and other publications, and is a highly cited researcher (1% globally, Clarivate Web of Science, 2022, and 2022, with more than >34,000 citations according to Google Scholar). His work appears in leading academic journals in his fields including: The Lancet, Lancet Psychiatry, Nature Mental Health, World Psychiatry, The American Journal of Public Health, Social Science and Medicine, Translational Psychiatry, Journal of Affective Disorders, Journal of Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences.

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Select Publications

• Chan, J., Dominguez, G., Hua, A., Garabiles, M., Latkin, C., & Hall, B. J. (2024). The social determinants of migrant domestic worker (MDW) health and well-being in the Western Pacific Region: A scoping review. PLOS Global Public Health doi: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0002628
• Hall, B. J., Yang, X., Huang, L., Yi, Grace, Chan, E. W. W., Tucker, J. D., & Latkin, C. (2020). Barriers and facilitators of rapid HIV and syphilis testing uptake among Filipino transnational migrants in China. AIDS and Behavior, 24, 418-427
• Hall, B. J., Garabiles, M.R., & Latkin, C. (2019). Work life, relationship, and policy determinants of Health and Well-being among Filipino Domestic Workers in China: A Qualitative study. BMC Public Health, 19:229. doi: doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-6552-4
• Hall, B. J., Li, G., Chen, W., Shelley, D., & Tang, W. (2023). Prevalence of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation during the Shanghai 2022 Lockdown: A cross-sectional study. Journal of Affective Disorders, 330, 283-290. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2023.02.121
• Yang, L., Shaw, A., Nyman, T.J., & Hall, B. J. (2024). The prevalence of intimate partner violence and risk factors for women and men in China During the Shanghai 2022 Lockdown. Journal of Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences, 33, e14 1-13. doi: 10.1017/S2045796024000155
• Li, G., Sit, H.F., Chen, W., Wu, K., Sou, E.K.L., Wong, M., Chen, Z., Burchert, S., Hong, I.W., Sit, H.Y., Lam, A.I.F., & Hall, B. J. (2024). A WHO digital intervention to address depression among young Chinese adults: A type 1 effectiveness-implementation randomized controlled trial. Translational Psychiatry, 14:102. 10.1038/s41398-024-02812-3
• Montag, C. & Hall, B. J. (2023). Enhancing real-time digital surveillance can guide evidence-based policymaking to improve global mental health. Nature Mental Health, 1, 697-698. doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44220-023-00129-6
• Li, G., Shi, W., Gao, X., Shi, X., Feng, X., Liang, D., Li, C., Phillips, M.R., & Hall, B. J. (2022). Mental health and psychosocial interventions to limit the adverse psychological effects of disasters and emergencies in China: A scoping review. Lancet Regional Health – Western Pacific. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanwpc.2022.100580. Scoping review in support of the Lancet Commission for Mental Health in China.
• Gureje, O., Lewis-Fernandez, R., Hall, B. J., Reed, G. M. (2019). Systematic inclusion of culture-related information in ICD-11. World Psychiatry, 18, 3, 357-358. doi: doi.org/10.1002/wps.20676 

Education

• PhD, Clinical Psychology
  Kent State University