Therese L. Todd

Profile picture of faculty Therese L. Todd

Assistant Professor of Psychology

Curriculum Vitae

Email: [email protected]

Rose Hill Campus: Dealy Hall

  • Dr. Therese Todd holds a Ph.D. in Clinical and Forensic Psychology from the CUNY Graduate Center through John Jay College of Criminal Justice. She earned an M.Phil. in Psychology from the CUNY Graduate Center and an M.A. in Forensic Psychology from John Jay College. Her B.A. is in Psychology from the University of California Los Angeles. During her Ph.D. program, she received a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and was a research fellow at the Vera Institute of Justice. Dr. Todd completed her pre-doctoral clinical psychology internship at the Veteran Affairs Maryland Healthcare System on the serious mental illness track. She then was appointed as a Provostial Faculty Fellow/Assistant Professor in the School of Law at New York University and specifically in the NYU School of Law Policing Project, through the provost’s postdoctoral fellowship program. In fall 2026, Dr. Todd joins the faculty at Fordham University in the Department of Psychology as an Assistant Professor. 

    • 2016 BA in Psychology, University of California Los Angeles
    • 2023 PhD in Clinical and Forensic Psychology, CUNY Graduate Center, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
    • 2023 – 2026 Provostial Faculty Fellow, New York University School of Law

  • Dr. Todd is interested in mental health disparities in the criminal legal system and studies criminal justice and mental health policy. Specifically, she is interested in the criminalization of mental illness and how police and communities respond to mental and behavioral health crises. Dr. Todd’s current research is focused on building an evidence-base for non-police, alternative community safety response programs. In over 140 communities across the country, the public can now call 911 and receive a non-police response for non-violent, mental health and other quality-of-life-related 911 calls, instead of receiving a law enforcement response. Throughout her research career, Dr. Todd has explored outcomes of police encounters with people experiencing mental health crises, community safety needs, and how we can use non-police response options to prevent harm and increase safety and equity for those in need of help. Dr. Todd has also studied the stigmatization of mental illness and how it manifests in policing and the criminal legal system. 

  • Undergraduate

    • PSYC 1200 Foundations of Psychology
    • PSYC 2900 Psychopathology

  • Rouhani, S., Nagdeo, K., Gillooly, J., Weiss, M., Friedman, B., & Todd, T.L.* (2026). Access to non-police crisis response for people who use drugs: Lessons from community safety response programs in two US cities. BMC Public Health, 26, 2051. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-026-27744-z. 

    Todd, T.L., Lappen, H., Neath, S., Markham, M., Purtle, J., Allen, B., Rouhani, S., & Friedman, B. (2025). Transforming first response through non-police, community safety response programs: A peer-reviewed and grey literature scoping review protocol. BMJ Open, 15(12), e109499. https://doi.org/10.1136/ bmjopen-2025-109499. 

    Todd, T.L., Chauhan, P, Pope, L.G., & Watson, A. (2025). Responding to crisis: The intersection of police officer attitudes, culture, and mental health encounters. BMC Public Health, 25(3371). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-025-23832-8. 

    Mauri, A., Lindenfeld, Z., Wilson, C., Todd, T.L., Purtle, J., & Silver, D. (2025). Determinants of when Community Behavioral Health Clinics partner with emergency response systems: The role of capacity in 911 referral and co-response models. The Milbank Quarterly. 

    Rouhani, S., Machavariani, E., McSorley, A.M., Todd, T.L., & Purtle, J. (2025). Disparities in willingness to call the police in a 2023 survey of US adults: Implications for alternative crisis response programs. Preventive Medicine, 108358. 

     

    Currently Under Review

    Todd, T.L., Chauhan, P., & Yanos, P. T. (revise & resubmit). Explicit and implicit biases against people with mental illness are more negative among police officers than the general public.  

    Todd, T.L., Sissoko, G., Todd, K., Friedman, B., & Mauri, A. (revise & resubmit). A Deadly Intersection: The role of race and mental illness in 11 years of police killings.