About the Centre for Digital Habits
Our work originated in doctoral research at the University of Oxford. Our team combines product engineering with decades of expertise in mental health and education.
Founders
A decade of research at Oxford, joined by people who have spent their careers building products and supporting students.
Dr Ulrik LyngsResearch Fellow, University of Oxford. Member of Denmark’s national Media Council for Children and Youth.Profile ↗
Maureen FreedPsychotherapist and mental health consultant. Formerly Deputy Head of Counselling, University of Oxford.
Dr Konrad KollnigProfessor at the Law & Tech Lab, Maastricht University. Developer of TrackerControl.Profile ↗
Roxane MaarFounder of several technology ventures. Board member at Denmark’s largest international school. Formerly with the UN.LinkedInResearch assistants
Tiago CostaBA Experimental Psychology, First Class, University of Oxford.
Ena Heide PoulsenMSci Psychology and Philosophy, University of Oxford. Formerly CMO at WeFocus.Advisors and collaborators
Researchers in human-computer interaction and data, who keep the work honest.
Professor Sir Nigel ShadboltHead of Human Centred Computing, University of OxfordProfile ↗
Dr Kai LukoffHead of HCI Lab, Santa Clara UniversityProfile ↗
Dr Petr SlovakUKRI Future Leaders Fellow, King’s College LondonProfile ↗
Professor Kasper HornbækHuman-Centred Computing, University of CopenhagenProfile ↗
Dr Laura AlessandrettiAssociate Professor, Technical University of DenmarkProfile ↗
Stuart ColemanDirector of Learning and Consultancy, Open Data InstituteProfile ↗How we got here.
Ten years from doctoral research to a programme running in more than 30 institutions.
- 2016
Research begins as Ulrik Lyngs’s doctoral work at Oxford, supervised by Sir Nigel Shadbolt.
- 2019
The first workshop prototype runs in Oxford colleges. Our review of digital self-control tools is published at ACM CHI.
- 2022
Workshops scale up and are tested with new audiences in Denmark and Thailand.
- 2023
UK-wide pilot workshops, funded through a UKRI Impact Acceleration Account.
- 2024
The workshop evaluation is published at ACM CHI. Oxford Social Impact Award. The first Facilitator Course runs in November.
- 2026
ImpactU backs our UK-wide rollout. The Reduce Digital Distraction Project becomes Centre for Digital Habits.