Academy Fellow

Lisa M. Given is Professor of Information Sciences and Director, Social Change Enabling Impact Platform, RMIT University (Melbourne). Her interdisciplinary research in human information behaviour brings a critical, social research lens to studies of technology use and human-focused design. She is one of the most highly cited scholars in her discipline and among the top 2% of researchers, globally. Her studies embed social change, focusing on diverse settings and populations, and methodological innovations across disciplines. She holds numerous grants funded by the Australian Research Council, the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, and Canada’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, with university and community partners across disciplines. Her focus on integrating social, human-centred, interdisciplinary approaches to research, including addressing implications for ethics and integrity, has changed research practices, nationally and globally.

Lisa is a former President of both the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) and the Canadian Association for Information Science (CAIS). She served on the Australian Research Council’s College of Experts, the Council of Canadian Academies’ Expert Panel on Research Integrity, and on Canada’s Interagency (SSHRC, NSERC, CIHR) Advisory Panel on Research Ethics. Her work on the Panel’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Ethics Special Working Committee led to revisions to Canada’s Tri-Council Policy Statement on Research Ethics and 11 reports on privacy, confidentiality, internet research, and creative practice. Lisa was lead author on the “Chapter on Qualitative Research” that was added to Canada’s policy, which is used by all Canadian researchers and ethics boards.

Lisa is an award-winning research methodologist who conducts innovative work in qualitative and interdisciplinary research practices, including creating new methods and studying societal impact and community engagement. In 2021, Lisa received her discipline’s highest honour (the ASIS&T Sig-USE Award for Outstanding Contributions to Information Behavior Research) and was appointed to the Sig-USE Academy of Fellows. She co-designs projects with academic and industry colleagues across a broad range of disciplines and professional contexts, including computing science, design, digital humanities, ecology, education, information science, medicine, nursing, oenology, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and theatre studies, among others. She has educated and supervised researchers in qualitative practices, worldwide, fostering adoption of social sciences research approaches. Her award-winning methods are used by academics and by practitioners in hospitals, libraries, schools, and community settings.

Lisa is Editor-in-Chief of ASIS&T’s Annual Review of Information Science and Technology. She is lead author of the forthcoming 5th edition of Looking for Information: Examining Research on How People Engage with Information (Emerald, 2023), author of 100 Questions (and Answers) about Qualitative Research (Sage, 2016), and editor of The Sage Encyclopedia of Qualitative Research Methods (2008). You can follow her on Twitter @lisagiven and read more about her work at https://lisagiven.com/

Professor of Information Sciences & Director, Social Change Enabling Impact Platform (2022-present)

Adjunct Professor, School of Design and Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology (2022-present)

Dean, Research and Development (Health, Arts & Design), Swinburne University of Technology (2017-2022)

Professor of Information Studies, Charles Sturt University (2011-2017)

Director, International Institute for Qualitative Methodology, University of Alberta (2007-2009)

Professor of Information Studies, University of Alberta, Canada (2000-2011)

Fellow, Sig-USE Academy, Association for Information Science & Technology

Distinguished Scholar, International Institute for Qualitative Methodology

Member, Australian Research Council, College of Experts (2011-2014)

President, Association for Information Science & Technology (2017-2018)

Member, Canada’s Interagency Advisory Panel on Research Ethics (2010-2012)

President, Canadian Association for Information Science (2006-2007)

Association for Information Science & Technology, Sig-USE Award, Outstanding Contributions to Information Behavior Research (2021)

Vice-Chancellor’s Engagement Award, Swinburne University of Technology –Community Engagement Team Award (2021, with Dr Wade Kelly)

Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Research Supervision, Charles Sturt University (2015)

Martha Cook Piper Research Prize for Excellence in Social Sciences and Humanities Research, University of Alberta (2010)

Young Alumni Award of Merit for Research Excellence, University of Western Ontario (2010)

1. Given, Lisa M., Donald O. Case, and Rebekah Willson. [In Press – 2023]. Looking for Information: Examining Research on How People Engage with Information. 5th Edition. London, UK: Emerald Press.

2. Keith, Ryan J., Lisa M. Given, John M. Martin, and Dieter F. Hochuli. 2022. “Collaborating with qualitative researchers to co-design social-ecological studies.” Austral Ecology 47(4): 880-888. https://doi.org/10.1111/aec.13172

3. Given, Lisa M., Helen Partridge, and Katherine Howard. 2022. “Supporting collaborative research in information science: The RADAR program as a model for academic-practitioner team engagement.” Library and Information Science Research 44(2). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2022.101152

4. Ward, Wesley, and Lisa M. Given. 2019. “Assessing intercultural communication: Testing technology tools for information sharing in multinational research teams.” Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology 70(4): 338-350. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.24159

5. Cook, Kay, Lisa M. Given, Georgia Keam, and Lisa Young. 2019. “Technological opportunities for procedural justice in welfare administration: A review of available apps.” Critical Social Policy 1-22. https://doi.org/10.1177/0261018319860498