Skip to main content

Robert A. Murphy

Professor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Psychiatry, Child & Family Mental Health & Community Psychiatry
Box 104424, Durham, NC 27710
1121 W Chapel Hill St., Suite 100, Durham, NC 27701

Overview


Dr. Murphy is a licensed clinical psychologist focused on child traumatic stress, including its treatment and prevention and development and dissemination of evidence-based interventions. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University School of Medicine. Dr. Murphy serves as Executive Director for the Center for Child & Family Health (CCFH), a community and three university partnership (Duke University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and North Carolina Central University) dedicated to research, training, and intervention related to child trauma and maltreatment. Interests include treatment and prevention of child maltreatment and traumatic stress, dissemination of evidence based interventions, and improving mental health care for military families. In partnership with the Duke Sanford School of Public Policy Center for Child and Family Policy, he has been active in the development and evaluation, via two randomized controlled trials, of a brief, postnatal, universal nurse home visiting program (Family Connects) that has demonstrated improved parenting and parental distress, as well as reduced emergency medical care costs and lower rates of reported child maltreatment. Since 2003, CCFH has been a community treatment and services center within the National Child Traumatic Stress Network focused on improving access to evidence based mental health care for foster care youth and developing trauma informed child welfare systems.

Current Appointments & Affiliations


Professor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences · 2025 - Present Psychiatry, Child & Family Mental Health & Community Psychiatry, Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences
Affiliate of the Center for Child and Family Policy · 2015 - Present Center for Child and Family Policy, Sanford School of Public Policy

In the News


Published August 6, 2024
Trauma Team Provides Care for Patients While Supporting Each Other
Published November 9, 2023
Duke Psychiatry Program Expands Mental Health Support for Foster Children

View All News

Recent Publications


The effects of a universal short-term home visiting program: Two-year impact on parenting behavior and parent mental health.

Journal Article Child Abuse Negl · June 2023 BACKGROUND: At the time of childbirth, families face heightened levels of unmet need. These needs, if left unmet, can lead parents to engage in less positive parenting practices, which in turn, increase the risk of child maltreatment. Family Connects (FC) ... Full text Open Access Link to item Cite

Evaluation of a Family Connects Dissemination to Four High-Poverty Rural Counties.

Journal Article Matern Child Health J · May 2022 OBJECTIVES: Home visiting is a popular approach to improving the health and well-being of families with infants and young children in the United States; but, to date, no home visiting program has achieved population impact for families in rural communities ... Full text Open Access Link to item Cite

Maximizing the return on investment in Early Childhood Home Visiting through enhanced eligibility screening.

Journal Article Child Abuse Negl · December 2021 BACKGROUND: The MIECHV (Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting) program invests substantial federal resources to prevent child maltreatment and emergency medical costs. Eligibility is based on screening of demographic or clinical risk factors, ... Full text Open Access Link to item Cite
View All Publications

Recent Grants


Major League Baseball's Welcome Back Veterans

ResearchPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by McCormick Foundation · 2011 - 2017

View All Grants

Education, Training & Certifications


University of Massachusetts, Amherst · 1996 Ph.D.
University of Massachusetts, Amherst · 1993 M.S.
University of Massachusets, Boston · 1989 B.A.