PH.D., ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Professor Sivakumar’s research interests are in the intersection of health communication and digital media. She studies how people learn from mediated information especially on topics of which they have no prior information or knowledge. Her recent work examines how chronically ill patients evaluate online health websites and how the quality of the information presented in such websites affects patient beliefs about the disease, their compliance intentions, and the trust they have in their doctors. Her work also examines how people make judgments about about the credibility of information they read online and how such judgments can impact their medical decision making.
Center for Science Communication 