Dr Liz Sillence completed her PhD At Birmingham University in 2003 and joined the Department of Psychology at Northumbria University later that year. She is a founding member of the PaCT (Psychology and Communication Technologies) Lab. Liz leads undergraduate modules in eHealth and research placements on the MRes programme and contributes to research supervision of undergraduate, Masters and PhD students. Liz’s current research interest centre on ehealth and she is currently investigating the trust and privacy issues associated with the technological sharing of personal health data. Liz is also a member of the hoarding research group within the department investigating the cybersecurity issues related to digital hoarding.

Liz is an eHealth researcher, examining psychological aspects of users’ online interactions around eHealth information. She works at the intersection of psychology and digital technology and her research has a strong focus on trust and identity. She seeks to understand how people interact with digital information and advice and how they use it to inform their health decision-making and improve their wellbeing. There is a strong practical element to her research, in which she strives to see her findings applied to positive effect in the design and development of online resources for patients.  

Understanding the interaction between users and their digital information is at the heart of Liz's research and the application of psychology to risky informational settings has allowed her to examine trust, identity and wellbeing around digital information management in relation to security and the hoarding of digital data.