Elizabeth Sillence

Northumbria University · School of Life Sciences

Background: Despite being a normal part of life for many, menstruation is often stigmatized resulting in reduced knowledge of reusable products such as menstrual cups. YouTube videos can raise awareness of menstrual cups and challenge stigma, but little is known about the content creators or what content is communicated in the videos. Aim: Firstly,...

Background: Investigating perceptions of control over mortality risk may be fundamental to understanding health behaviours and tackling socioeconomic gradients in health. Few studies have explored perceptions of control over different causes of death and there is a lack of qualitative risk research. Our aim was to examine participants' perceptions...

Technology to enable and support learning and teaching is widespread in university settings. One consequence of such technology use is the accumulation of large volumes of digital data. The acquisition of, and failure to, discard digital content can lead to digital clutter. The potential negative consequences of digital clutter have been examined m...

Background The emerging landscape of patient-generated data (PGData) provides an opportunity to collect large quantities of information that can be used to develop our understanding of different health conditions and potentially improve the quality of life for those living with long-term health condition (LTHCs). If the potential benefits of PGData...

Background The growing popularity of collecting self-generated health and lifestyle data presents a valuable opportunity to develop our understanding of long-term health conditions and improve care. Barriers remain to the effective sharing of health and lifestyle data by those living with long-term health conditions which include beliefs around con...

Using digital technology to share patient-generated health data has the potential to improve the self-management of multiple long-term health conditions. Sharing these data can allow patients to receive additional support from healthcare professionals and peer communities, as well as enhance their understanding of their own health. A deeper underst...

Smartphones are now a ubiquitous part of daily life for adolescents in the United Kingdom, who use their phones for a multitude of reasons beyond calling or texting. To date, little qualitative research has been conducted with adolescent smartphone users about their experiences of smartphone use, particularly problematic or excessive use. This stud...

Staff behaviour plays a key role in the cybersecurity position of an organisation. Despite this, behaviour-change interventions are not commonly applied within the field of cybersecurity. Behaviour change technique could be particularly beneficial given increasing concerns around healthcare cybersecurity risks; particularly following the 2017 Wanna...

There are organizational and individual problems associated with the excessive accumulation of digital material, but little is known about why people hoard digital information in the workplace. We interviewed 20 participants from two large knowledge-intensive organizations (one academic, one commercial). These participants scored highly on the Digi...

There are increasing concerns relating to cybersecurity of healthcare data and medical devices. Cybersecurity in this sector is particularly important given the criticality of healthcare systems, the impacts of a breach or cyberattack (including in the worst instance, potential physical harm to patients) and the value of healthcare data to criminal...

Objective: Internet resources remain important for health information and advice but their specific role in decision-making is understudied, often assumed and remains unclear. In this article, we examine the different ways in which internet resources play a role in health decision-making within the context of distributed decision-making. Methods:...

Estrangement from a family member is characterised by lack of trust and emotional intimacy, and often includes ceased communication and contact. Existing estrangement research suggests adult children report three main reasons for estrangement from a parent: abuse, poor parenting and betrayal. However, research into estrangement and experiences of p...

Alcohol hangover syndrome (AHS) is a highly heterogenous state encompassing a range of physiological and psychological symptoms. The syndrome is experienced regularly among alcohol consumers and remains poorly understood. The present study sought to gain insight into whether certain emotions were tied to AHS and how these emotions were experienced....

This study examines how posters on an online forum discussed their own current and past decision-making in response to a celebrity health announcement. We examined messages in response to a celebrity narrative, and extracted those explicitly related to decision-making around genetic testing and preventative surgery. Using deductive coding we identi...

The relationship between social media use and mental health remains under scrutiny by researchers, policy makers, and the general public. Recently, researchers have addressed whether or not Facebook use is beneficial to people with high social anxiety. The findings from such studies are mixed, in part due to differences in how variables are operati...

Introduction: Understanding how teenagers think about sexual health and assessing the ways in which they engage with sexual health information are important issues in the development of appropriate sexual health education programmes. Sexual health education programs in the UK are inconsistent and is not possible to assume that teenagers' informati...

Today, new mothers are experiencing parenthood differently. Digital resources can provide a wealth of information, present opportunities for socialising, and even assist in tracking a baby's development. However, women are often juggling the role of motherhood with other commitments, such as work. The aim of this workshop is to understand the digit...

The social and psychological characteristics of individuals who hoard physical items are quite well understood, however very little is known about the psychological characteristics of those who hoard digital items and the kinds of material they hoard. In this study, we designed a new questionnaire (Digital Behaviours Questionnaire: DBQ) comprising...

Given the considerable emphasis placed on informed choice, the management of health information has become an increasingly important part of living with chronic illness. This paper explores the intra‐familial dynamics of managing health information in the context of chronic illness. Drawing on 77 interviews with people affected by Multiple Sclerosi...

Although the support provided by social relationships may be essential to a successful student transition, the transition to postgraduate study has had little consideration from a social support perspective. The study described in this article investigated the role played by social support in postgraduate taught students’ adjustment to university,...

To date, the majority of research into a good death has focused on the experience of the person who is dying. Taking the perspective of bereaved individuals, this qualitative study explores which elements of the end of life experience constitute a good death and how these elements influence the process of bereavement adjustment. Following interview...

It is now easier than ever before to access digital health information. Individuals can monitor and record information about their own health, gather information online, and share personal experiences with those in a similar position. In fact, this shift towards peer-to-peer sharing sites represents a significant change in the way people think abou...

BACKGROUND The internet continues to offer new forms of support for health decision making. Government, charity, and commercial websites increasingly offer a platform for shared personal health experiences, and these are just some of the opportunities that have arisen in a largely unregulated arena. Understanding how people trust and act on this in...

Background The internet continues to offer new forms of support for health decision making. Government, charity, and commercial websites increasingly offer a platform for shared personal health experiences, and these are just some of the opportunities that have arisen in a largely unregulated arena. Understanding how people trust and act on this in...

Hoarding behaviours associated with the accumulation of physical objects has become a newly diagnosed psychiatric disorder, with the demographic, social and psychological characteristics of individuals who hoard items being reasonably well established. Online forums, blogs, and the media have long-speculated about the existence of ‘digital hoarding...

User-generated health videos are prevalent on video-sharing sites. Recently, ‘bro-science’ has emerged as a sub-genre in which users test products on themselves, produce evidence and seek to persuade others of their efficacy. But what are the motivations of the producers of these videos? Using the issue of baldness, we explore the motivations of po...

The increasing volume of Internet based health resources means that decisions about how to trust information and advice encountered online become ever more complicated. As peer-to-peer experiences become a source of health information, lay people are required to evaluate the trustworthiness of such online personal accounts. In this paper, we presen...

In this paper, we describe how people negotiate and communicate with healthcare professionals (HCPs) about information they have found online for the purposes of making health decisions. Drawing on 55 interviews with people using the Internet as part of their health decision-making we show how online information can be successfully integrated into...

Mobile technology has become an increasingly popular source for female teenagers to seek sexual health information. However, it is not known what design features teenagers want in sexual health apps. Therefore, this research aimed to explore whether internet-based sexual health resources via websites and mobiles apps are meeting teenagers' sexual h...

In this chapter we introduce some key ideas relating to the evaluation of behaviour change interventions. We discuss the notion of measurement and consider who benefits from behaviour change interventions, how this is assessed and reflect on the longevity of the effect. These issues are situated within the context of two case studies. The case stud...

Objective: To investigate the ways in which people use online support groups (OSGs) in relation to their health decision-making and to identify the key features of the resource that support those activities. Method: Eighteen participants who used OSGs for a range of health conditions participated in qualitative study in which they were interview...

Behavior Change Research and Theory: Psychological and Technological Perspectives provides a unified account of behavior change theories and broad coverage of application domains and best practices. From a psychological and human-computer interaction perspective, the book puts a strong emphasis on the psychological foundations of behavior change, a...

Background Traditional health information has been based on facts and figures and not on patient experience (PEx). Websites featuring people’s accounts of their experiences of health and illness are popular as a source of information, support and much else. However, there are concerns that experiential information on the internet might have adverse...

Background: This study tested the efficacy of self-affirmation in promoting fruit and vegetable consumption in a sample of participants comprising two groups at high risk of low consumption: young adults and mothers of school-aged children with low social economic status (SES). Methods: Baseline fruit and vegetable consumption was recorded for 8...

The internet has become an increasingly important way of communicating with consumers about food risk information. However, relatively little is known about how consumers evaluate and come to trust the information they encounter online. Using the example of unpasteurized or raw milk this paper presents two studies exploring the trust factors associ...

Background: An increasing number of people are now turning to the Internet for health information. Internet use is especially likely in women with the clinical condition premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), which affects approximately 8% of premenopausal women. However, to date, there has not been a review of the quality of these online resourc...

The Internet supports the peer-to-peer healthcare and the promotion of shared patient narratives. Websites incorporating these narratives or personal accounts are known to offer support to carers of people with multiple sclerosis, but little is known about how carers make choices about what websites to visit and why. In total, 20 carers viewed a ra...

Patients will often resist campaigns to promote healthier behavior but the digital health revolution allows the creation of a much more nuanced set of health messages that can be tailored to the patient or end user. In this study we explore the effects of patient preference on message acceptance and also explore what happens when messages are frame...

Patients and carers frequently get their health information and advice from websites containing patient-led, shared health experiences. This means that they often engage in a very idiosyncratic selection process in order to determine which websites have personally resonant material. In this paper we used a Repertory Grid (repgrid) technique to elic...

Cyberbullying is a growing social problem especially amongst school aged children facilitated by the prevalent use of communication technology. This paper examines (a) the extent to which cyberbullying incidents are distinguishable by perceived severity and (b) the role of perpetrator anonymity on such perceptions of severity. Sixty six female scho...

Cyberbullying is a growing social problem especially amongst school aged children facilitated by the prevalent use of communication technology. This paper examines (a) the extent to which cyberbullying incidents are distinguishable by perceived severity and (b) the role of perpetrator anonymity on such perceptions of severity. Sixty six female scho...

Patients now turn to other patients online for health information and advice in a phenomenon known as peer-to-peer healthcare. This paper describes a model of patients' peer-to-peer engagement, based upon qualitative studies of three patient or carer groups searching for online information and advice from their health peers. We describe a three-pha...

Fraudulent transactions occurring via the Internet or Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) present a considerable problem for financial institutions and consumers alike. Whilst a number of technological improvements have helped reduce the likelihood of security breaches, users themselves have an integral role to play in reducing technology mediated fra...

Patient education (PE) has a crucial role in the function of a healthcare organisation. For the care process of a patient, it is essential to get the right information at the right moment and in the right form. This paper analyses PE as the primary mode of interaction between a patient and a healthcare organisation. The approach is illustrated with...

Background: Recent estimates suggest that a quarter of people who go online for health or medical information are drawn to content posted by their peers. This trend towards peer-to-peer healthcare raises a number of questions: What are the processes through which patients engage with online peer experiences? How do they decide what peer information...

Introduction: There is growing interest in the “raw milk debate” with increasing numbers of websites dedicated to discussing the "facts" around this issue. However, little is known about how people use the Internet to seek trusted information about consuming diary products. Rationale and Objectives: To carry out a psychological investigation to bet...

Abstract People have access to experiential information and advice about health online. The types of advice exchanged affect the nature of online communities and potentially patient decision making. The aim of this study was to examine the ways in which peers exchange advice within an online health forum in order to better understand online groups...

Shared patient experience (PEx) has become common on the medical Internet and is a potentially valuable source of health information and advice, but little is known about how we choose to incorporate PEx in our information gathering and health decision-making. An online questionnaire revealed a paradox: patients like PEx and are drawn to sites cont...

In this paper, data from qualitative investigations with three discrete health groups were pooled in order to identify factors that affect engagement with online material. A total sample of 74 participants (29 asthma sufferers, 25 smokers considering quitting, and 20 personal carers of people with multiple sclerosis (MS)) took part in a study in wh...

This report reflects on the current provision of qualitative research methods within a UK psychology department's teaching programmes. It considers how this has contributed to the poor integration of qualitative research methods into undergraduate teaching and also considers how some key conceptual issues need to be addressed in order to facilitate...

Background: Experiential websites such as message forums and blogs allow Prostate Cancer (PCa) patients to communicate their health decisions to peers. The issues surrounding this form of indirect involvement in public health are little understood. Objective: This paper explores the types of decision-making processes that people are exposed to o...

This article explores the role of the Internet in health behaviour, with particular emphasis on the issue of trust and trusting behaviours, as this is seen as key to determining the impact of the Internet on health outcomes. It is organized as follows. The first section discusses the role of the Internet in the context of health information and adv...

The design of technical product is often focused in the development of that particular artefact. However, when we introduce new technology we don’t simply replace old technology with new, but change many things in the whole context of use. With the help of familiar examples from our everyday life we illustrate how far-reaching tiny-looking technolo...

Childhood obesity is a major concern in today's society. Research suggests the inclusion of the views and understandings of a target group facilitates strategies that have better efficacy. The objective of this study was to explore the concepts and themes that make up children's understandings of the causes and consequences of obesity. Participants...

The large scale deployment of mobile applications inevitably impacts upon our culture as a whole and affects more intimately our daily lives. Not all of these effects are desirable. In a market economy, ethical issues are not the most important drivers in the development of technology. In this article, we ask whether the mobile human-computer inter...

How do people decide which sites to use when seeking health advice online? We can assume, from related work in e-commerce, that general design factors known to affect trust in the site are important, but in this paper we also address the impact of factors specific to the health domain. The current study aimed to (1) assess the factorial structure o...

The potential for the internet to be utilised in the dissemination of health information is becoming increasingly apparent. This paper details the implementation of Self Affirmations into a web based programme, with the aim to assess the suitability of the web as a mode to deliver techniques that seek to motivate behaviour change. 58 undergraduate...

The large scale deployment of mobile applications inevitably impacts upon our culture as a whole and affects more intimately our daily lives. Not all of these effects are desirable. In a market economy, ethical issues are not the most important drivers in the development of technology. In this chapter, the authors ask whether the mobile human-compu...

Fraudulent activity on the Internet, in particular the practice known as ‘Phishing’, is on the increase. Although a number of technology focussed counter measures have been explored user behaviour remains fundamental to increased online security. Encouraging users to engage in secure online behaviour is difficult with a number of different barriers...

Online health communities are one source of information and advice in which people, patients and their carers can exchange information and experiential advice. This advice is likely to be mixed in nature with some congenial, i.e., supportive of a person's existing standpoint and some uncongenial. This study examines how people manage the process of...

Developments in ubiquitous and pervasive computing herald a future in which computation is embedded into our daily lives. Such a vision raises important questions about how people, especially families, will be able to engage with and trust such systems whilst maintaining privacy and individual boundaries. To begin to address such issues, we have re...

In recent years, computer and Internet technologies have broadened the ways that people can stay in touch. Through interviews with parents and grandparents, we examined how people use existing technologies to communicate and share with their extended ...

Internet sites typically contain visual design elements that are unrelated to the quality of the health information presented but that could influence credibility judgments and responses to health advice. To assess the effects of such design elements, or credibility cues, experimentally, we exposed women with different levels of weekly alcohol cons...

The large scale deployment of mobile applications inevitably affects our daily lives and the whole culture. Not all of these effects are desirable. In a market economy, ethical issues are not the foremost drivers in the development of technology. In this paper, we ask whether the mobile human-computer interaction community could take an active role...

The number of people turning to the Internet to meet their various health needs is rising. As the prevalence of this form of e-health increases, so the issue of trust becomes ever more important. This chapter presents a brief overview of e-health and describes how and why people are using the Internet for health advice and information. In order to...

E-health refers to information and health services delivered via the Internet or related technologies. Whilst usage statistics suggests that the internet is an e-health success story issues surrounding quality of information, user interaction and personalization raise important questions for researchers and designers alike. The move towards ubiquit...

Traditionally, assessment in psychology degrees has relied on essays, practical reports and examinations. However, over recent years, many institutions have begun to explore and develop alternative forms of assessment with a greater emphasis on skills development. This report presents an evaluation of one such form of alternative summative assessme...

The notion of ubiquitous computing (ubicomp) has important implications for health care. Ubicomp scenarios involving the rapid communication of information between interested parties assume that health consumers will be willing to place their trust in agents rather than physicians, but are these assumptions reasonable? This article discusses what i...

The number of people turning to the Internet to meet their various health needs is rising. As the prevalence of this form of e-health increases, so the issue of trust becomes ever more important. This chapter presents a brief overview of e-health and describes how and why people are using the Internet for health advice and information. In order to...

Increasing numbers of people are turning to the Internet for health advice despite reports that sites vary in terms of their quality. How do they decide whether or not to trust the advice they find online? A staged model of trust development is proposed and tested here in a longitudinal study in which fifteen women faced with decisions concerning t...

In recent years the number of health related websites has increased dramatically and so have concerns regarding the quality of online information. The sheer volume of sites and the variety of information available have left health consumers potentially with greater choice but it is not clear whether these online changes are reflected in user behavi...

The Internet is a popular source of information and advice especially within the fields of health and finance. Previous research has raised the issue of quality with respect to online information and has suggested differences between the way consumers and experts search for and appraise online information. However, many studies have asked students...

Traditionally health advice has been anchored in face-to-face settings but increasingly patients are using the Internet for their health advice needs. This means that patients are now offered inconsistent advice from a range of sources and must determine which sites to trust and which to reject. To understand how consumers make these choices, 13 pa...

The number of people turning to the Internet to meet their various health needs is rising. As the prevalence of this form of e-health increases, so the issue of trust becomes ever more important. This chapter presents a brief overview of e-health and describes how and why people are using the Internet for health advice and information. In order to...