Kara L. Hall, Ph.D., is a Health Scientist, Director of the Science of Team Science (SciTS), and Director of the Theories Initiative in the Health Behaviors Research Branch (HBRB) at the National Cancer Institute (NCI). During her career, Dr. Hall has conducted and championed behavioral and social science (BSS) research in areas spanning health behavior theory, systems science, health promotion and disease prevention interventions, implementation science, and emerging cancer-related areas, such as sleep and circadian function and the intersection of climate change, behavior change, and health.
At NCI, Dr. Hall aims to advance BSS by fostering cross-disciplinary collaborations with researchers from across the biomedical community, and beyond. To this end, Dr. Hall has conducted numerous studies and developed new metrics, measures, and models for understanding, evaluating, and supporting transdisciplinary research, collaboration, and training. She helped launch the SciTS field with key efforts such as co-chairing the field's first conference in 2006 and co-editing the associated special supplement entitled, The Science of Team Science: Assessing the Value of Transdisciplinary Research in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine (2008). She has served leadership roles for the Annual International SciTS Conference since its inception in 2010 and as a founding board member of the International Network for the Science of Team Science (INSciTS) and the Global Alliance for inter- and transdisciplinarity (ITD-Alliance). Dr. Hall served as a member of The National Academies Committee on the Science of Team Science (2012-15) with the resulting report, Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science, highlighted as the third- most downloaded National Academies Press report in 2015. She has also developed practical resources, including NCI's Team Science Toolkit and Strategies for Team Science Success: Handbook of Evidence-Based Principles for Cross-Disciplinary Science and Practical Lessons Learned from Health Researchers (2019).
Dr. Hall earned her master's degree in psychology (clinical) and doctorate degree in psychology (experimental) from the University of Rhode Island (URI), with specializations in neuropsychology and behavioral science. Dr. Hall was awarded fellowships from the University of Rhode Island, American Cancer Society, and National Cancer Institute and is a graduate of the NCI Senior Executive Enrichment & Development Program and the NIH Senior Leadership Program.