Dr Becky Freeman

Senior Lecturer, School of Public Health

The University of Sydney

Dr Freeman is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Public Health, University of Sydney. She has seventeen years of experience working in the tobacco control field and is well versed in program and policy best practice. Dr Freeman was awarded her PhD, titled Tobacco control 2.0: Studies on the relevance of online media to tobacco control, in July 2011. As part of her PhD, she was the first researcher to publish papers on tobacco product promotions through the online social media websites YouTube and Facebook. Dr Freeman is an established authority on the potential of the Internet to circumvent tobacco advertising bans and has pioneered research methods in tracking and analysing online social media content. Dr Freeman is also the Associate Editor of New Media for the international journal, Tobacco Control.

Dr Freeman’s primary research interests include tobacco control, obesity prevention, and how online and social media influence public health. Prior to pursuing her research interests in Australia, she worked for both government and not for profit organisations in Canada and New Zealand.