Rate My Professor Laura Duncan

Dr. Laura Duncan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neurosciences at McMaster University and an Associate Member in the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact. She also serves as Research, Evaluation & Information Systems Lead at McMaster Children’s Hospital’s Child & Youth Mental Health Program. Dr. Duncan holds a BA (Hons) from the University of Oxford, an MA from McMaster University, and a PhD in Health Research Methodology from McMaster University. Her research focuses on child and youth psychiatric epidemiology, the measurement and assessment of child and youth mental health, and the design and implementation of population health approaches to evaluate mental health service responses. She has led the development and evaluation of tools such as the Ontario Child Health Study Emotional Behavioural Scales and the Mental Health Questionnaire for Children and Youth, and she guides information system development in partnership with community agencies.

Dr. Duncan received an Early Career Award from Hamilton Health Sciences Research and a New Investigator Research Grant from the SickKids Foundation and CIHR Institute of Human Development, Child and Youth Health. In 2026, she was named the Government of Ontario Chair in Early Child Development. Her key publications include a 2018 systematic review and meta-analysis on the test-retest reliability of child and adolescent psychiatric disorder classifications in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, as well as multiple 2019 and 2020 papers on the 2014 Ontario Child Health Study scales and children’s mental health needs and service contacts in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry and other journals. She is a co-principal investigator on projects involving deep-learning healthcare systems in child and youth mental health and collaborates on initiatives to improve data use in the sector.