About

Dr. Jin Li is a Professor of Education and Human Development at Brown University with a distinguished research career focused on the sociocultural models of learning in East Asian and Western contexts. Originally from China, she earned her B.A. in German from Guangzhou Institute of Foreign Languages in 1982, followed by multiple advanced degrees in education, including an Ed.D. in human development and psychology from Harvard University in 1997. Her research explores how cultural philosophies, values, and practices influence children's learning beliefs, parental socialization, and achievement across diverse cultural and ethnic groups, including children and families in China, Taiwan, Chinese American, European American, and other backgrounds. She has studied a wide age range from early childhood to college students and has contributed significantly to understanding the cultural foundations of learning through her publications and lectures delivered internationally. Her notable work includes the 2012 book 'Cultural Foundations of Learning: East and West,' which synthesizes decades of research and emphasizes the role of culture in human learning. Dr. Li's research has been funded by prominent foundations, and she has been recognized as an inaugural Fellow of the Berggruen Institute, supporting her work on the conceptualization of the self in Western and East Asian cultures. Her scholarly contributions extend to examining the influence of cultural philosophies on psychological development, self-concept, and affect, making her a leading figure in cross-cultural educational psychology and cultural psychology.

Research topics

• Biology
• Medicine
• Internal medicine
• Demography
• Paleontology
• Virology
• Surgery
• Ecology
• Geology
• Archaeology
• Geography

Selected publications

• Genomic insights into the formation of human populations in East Asia

  Nature · 2021 · 453 citations

  • Geography
  • Archaeology
  • Paleontology
  DOI

• Non-invasive early detection of cancer four years before conventional diagnosis using a blood test

  Nature Communications · 2020 · 639 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Medicine
  • Biology
  • Internal medicine

  Early detection has the potential to reduce cancer mortality, but an effective screening test must demonstrate asymptomatic cancer detection years before conventional diagnosis in a longitudinal study. In the Taizhou Longitudinal Study (TZL), 123,115 healthy subjects provided plasma samples for long-term storage and were then monitored for cancer occurrence. Here we report the preliminary results of PanSeer, a noninvasive blood test based on circulating tumor DNA methylation, on TZL plasma samples from 605 asymptomatic individuals, 191 of whom were later diagnosed with stomach, esophageal, colorectal, lung or liver cancer within four years of blood draw. We also assay plasma samples from an additional 223 cancer patients, plus 200 primary tumor and normal tissues. We show that PanSeer detects five common types of cancer in 88% (95% CI: 80-93%) of post-diagnosis patients with a specificity of 96% (95% CI: 93-98%), We also demonstrate that PanSeer detects cancer in 95% (95% CI: 89-98%) of asymptomatic individuals who were later diagnosed, though future longitudinal studies are required to confirm this result. These results demonstrate that cancer can be non-invasively detected up to four years before current standard of care.

  DOI

• Clinical characteristics of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 reactivation

  Journal of Infection · 2020 · 376 citations

  • Medicine
  • Internal medicine
  • Virology
  DOI

Recent grants

• Fate and Transport of Biocolloids in Beach Sand

  NSF · $507k · 2009–2014

• NIH Grant R01HL112642

  NIH · $1.5M · 2016

• Cancer Research Training and Education Coordination

  NIH · $51.9M · 1997–2026

• NIH Grant P41RR003655

  NIH · $2.2M · 2012

Frequent coauthors

• Shuhua Xu

  University of Chinese Academy of Sciences

  742 shared

• Hao Chen

  University of Macau

  674 shared

• Jiucun Wang

  Fudan University

  599 shared

• Xingdong Chen

  Taizhou University

  555 shared

• Yang Gao

  Fudan University

  452 shared

• Bo Chen

  Wenzhou Medical University

  437 shared

• Bo Chen

  Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College

  437 shared

• Sijia Wang

  Shanghai Institute of Nutrition and Health

  405 shared

Education

• B.A., German

  Guangzhou Institute of Foreign Languages

  1982

• M.A., Education

  University of Pittsburgh

  1988

• M.A., Administrative Planning and Social Policy

  University of Pittsburgh

  1991

• Other, Human Development and Psychology

  Harvard University

  1997

Awards & honors

• Fellow of Berggruen Institute (2015-17)
• Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanfo…
• Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University (2015-17)
• The Self in the West and East Asia: Being or Becoming (2024)

Similar researchers at Brown University

• Shouheng Sunh-193
• Lai-Sheng Wangh-168
• Huajian Gaoh-156
• Christopher Schmidh-151
• Karen Furieh-148