About Me

In addition to being a licensed clinical psychologist, I am also an Associate Professor at San Francisco State University (SF State). I direct the Stress, Trauma, & Resilience Lab, teach classes on personality and psychopathology, and mentor graduate students. I also train future therapists in the use of a range of therapies, including but not limited to acceptance and commitment therapy, emotion-focused therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy, and short-term psychodynamic therapy.

Education & Training

I earned my PhD in Clinical Psychology from Arizona State University. As part of pre-doctoral training, I completed a year long residency at the University of Illinois, Chicago Medical Center. I also completed a two year postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, San Francisco Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Services.

Research & Publications

Over the past 15+ years, my clinical experience, teaching activities and research program have centered on understanding and managing the effects of stress on the brain and body. I have published more than 80 peer-reviewed studies on stress, trauma, resilience and mental health, and this work has informed my clinical practice. Below are a just a few of these publications.

Hagan, M.J., Hernandez, B., & Batchelder, A. (2025). Self-worth in mental health: At the intersection of mattering and significance. A. Kruglanski, I. Prilleltensky, & A. Raviv (Eds.), The Routledge International Handbook of Human Significance and Mattering. Taylor & Francis.

Wu, E. W., Hagan, M. J., Eschleman, K., & Gard, D. E. (2024). Hardiness predicts mental health recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 16(6):971-979.

Hagan, M.J., *Hernandez, M.M., Enriquez, L.E., & Ayon, C. (2024) Immigration status, legal vulnerability, and suicidal/self-harm ideation disparities among immigrant-origin Latinx young adults in the U.S. Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities,11(4):2129-2140.

Hagan, M., Lara, J., Montanes, M.C. (2021). Childhood adversity, socioemotional functioning and generalized anxiety in young adults from mixed immigration status families. Child Abuse & Neglect, 118, 105128.

Hagan, M.J., Coccia, M., Rivera, L., Epel, E., Aschbacher, K., Lieberman, A.F., & Bush, N.R. (2021). Longitudinal hair cortisol in low-income young children: A useful biomarker of symptom change? Psychoneuroendocrinology, 133, 1-9.