Networks, Groups and Social Interaction

• Actor Network Resource (ANT)
  A review of references in actor network theory, a major theoretical approach in the sociology of science and technology. Editors: Olaf Boettger and John Law (Centre for Social Theory and Technology, Keele University, UK).

• Backstrom, Lars / Boldi, Paolo / Rosa, Marco / Ugander, Johan / Vigna, Sebastiano
  [2012] Four Degrees of Separation
  In: Cornell University Library, Social and In formation Networks
  The results of the first world-scale social-network graph-distance computations, using the entire Facebook network of active users (approx 721 million users, approx 69 billion friendship links). The average distance they observe is 4.74, corresponding to 3.74 intermediaries or “degrees of separation”. This shows that the world is even smaller than expected.

• Behaviorology - International Behaviorology Institute (TIBI)
  Dedicated to forwarding the science of contingent behaviorrelations as developed and championed by B.F. Skinner.

• B.F. Skinner Foundation
  The major function of this foundation is to preserve and maintain Skinner’s works and other behavioral classics that should be available to all students.

• Burke, Peter J.
  Burke is known for his research on identity theory and his innovative work with computer simulations of social behavior.
  • [1996] Agency and Interaction
    An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, August, 1996.
    The connection between macro-level group characteristics (social structure) and the micro-level interaction between individuals is analyzed by focusing on the nature of the individual that is affected by structural characteristics and, with others, produces the patterns of interaction that characterize aspects of social structure. Two basic models of the individual are considered: one based on the backward-looking, passive models of operant learning theory implicit in social exchange theory, the other based on the forward-looking, agency model implicit in identity theory and affect control theory. Burke shows that (1) stable interaction structures do not emerge under any forms of the operant learning model, but do under the agent models and that (2) the structural conditions are important for the type of structure that emerges for the agent models, but have no impact on the outcomes under the operant models.

  • [1997] An Identity Model for Network Exchange
    In: American Sociological Review 62:134-150.
    Burke introduces a dynamic model of the exchange process in which network nodes are based on a model of identity processes. He uses the assumptions of identity theory to model the identity of a ‘typical’ experimental subject whose primary goal is to participate in exchanges in an experimental paradigm.

  • [2003] Interaction in Small Groups
    In: John DeLamater (ed.) [2003] Handbook of Social Psychology. New York: Kluwer-Plenum. pp. 363-388.

  • [2003] Relationships among Multiple Identities
    In: Peter J. Burke, Timothy J. Owens, Richard T. Serpe, Peggy A. Thoits (eds.) [2003] Advances in Identity Theory and Research. New York: Kluwer-Plenum, pp. 195-214.
    Each person has as many selves as others with whom they interact. However, very little has been theorized or investigated about the way in which these multiple identities relate to each other, or activated, or jointly operate to influence behavior. Most identity research focuses on one or another identity that people have without asking questions about how those identities relate to each other or what the implications are for understanding behavior that such behavior may function to verrfy (or not) more than one identity. Burke distinguishes two different issues in the relationship between and among multiple identities. (1) The external focus that addresses how the multiple identities of an individual are tied into the complexities of the social structure(s) in which the individual is embedded. (2) The internal focus addresses how the mulpiple identities that an individual has function together within the self, or within the overall self-verification process, and the implications of this proces for the multiple identities held.

  • [2004] Identities, Events, and Moods
    In: Advances in Group Processes 21:25-49.
    Identity verification is the ongoing process of controlling perceptions of selfrelevant meanings in a situation so that they correspond to the meanings held in the identity standard that defines who one is in the situation. When a disturbance to this process occurs leading to a lack of such correspondence, a person’s identities are not verified. They engage in behavior that serves to counteract the disturbance and change meanings and resources in the situation so that one’s reflected appraisals or perceived self-relevant meanings once again match the meanings held in one’s identity standard. Accompanying this cognitive-behavioral process, there is an affective response to the discrepancy between perceptions and standard.

  • [2005] Identity Control Theory
    In: George Ritzer (ed.) [2005] Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology. Oxford: Blackwell.
    Identity control theory (ICT) focuses on the nature of persons identities (who they are) and the relationship between the persons identities and their behavior within the context of the social structure within which the identities are embedded. ICT grows out of identity theory and structural symbolic interaction theory more generally. These theories have several common properties.(1) The symbolic interaction perspective: behavior is premised on a named and classified world and people name each other and themselves in terms of the positions they occupy. (2) These positional labels or names and the expectations attached to them become internalized as the identities that make up the self. Self labels define persons in terms of positions in society and these positions carry the shared behavioral expectations. (3) These positions —conventionally labeled roles and groups— are relational in the sense that they tie individuals together. People have as many selves as they have relationships to others — through their identities, people are intimately tied to the social structure.

  • [2006] Identity Change
    In: Social Psychology Quarterly 69(1): 81-96.
    How do identities change? Burke examines two mechanisms by which persons’ identities change over time. (1) Identities influence the way in which a role is played out: discrepancies between the meanings of the identity standard and the meanings of the role performance will result in change. Due to the hierarchical structure of identity systems, change will occur not only to the role performance (to counteract the discrepancy), but also to the meanings of identity standard over time (to bring them more into line with the disturbance). (2)Persons are holding multiple identities that share meanings. Identities that share dimensions of meaning influence each other’s standard to maintain the shared meaning at a common level. Changing identity standards redefines who one is.

  • [2008] Identity, Social Status, and Emotion
    In: Jody Clay-Warner & Dawn Robinson (eds.) [2008] Social Structure and Emotion. San Diego: Elsiver. pp. 75-93.
    One of the differences among social positions is the amount of resources the position controls and hence the amount of status accorded to the occupant. Burke examines the effects of social status on the emotional impacts of the lack of identity verification. Status, conceptualized as a symbolic marker indicating who has control of resources, is hypothesized to have two effects. Status and resources help persons verify their identities, and at the same time, help to buffer the consequences of a lack of verifi cation.

  • [2013] Identity (Social)
    In: Byron Kaldis, Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the Social Sciences. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
    According to identity theory, identities define who a person is in terms of the groups or categories to which they belong (social identities), the roles they occupy (role identities), and the personal characteristics they claim (person identities).

  • (with Jan E. Stets) [2015] Identity Verification and the Social Order
    In: Lawler, Edward J. / Shane R. Thye / Jeongkoo, Yoon [2015] Order on the Edge of Chaos: Social Psychology and the Problem of Social Order. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp 145-164.
    The authors outline how identity verification has consequences for the construction and reconstruction of the social order. Identity verification occurs when individuals perceive self-relevant meanings in the situation that match who they are in that situation (their identity). Verification of an identity feels good. This generates solidarity (when facilitated by others) and adherence to norms. Identities are verified by individuals controlling the flow of resources in interaction, and it is this flow that maintains the social structure.

• Center for the Study of Group Processes - University of Iowa, USA.
  Information about group processes research, researchers & publications. Here you can also read the electronic journal: Current Research in Social Psychology. Edited by: Michael J. Lovagliva & Shane Soboroff.

• Collins, Randall - University of Pennsylvania, USA
  • [1998] The Golden Age of Macro-Historical Sociology

  • [2000] Interview with Randall Collins
    By Alair Maclean and James Yocom.
    Collins emphasizes that the real unit of analysis is the situation, and situations have their dynamics and individuals get constructed out of those situations. And he explains his interest in the sociology of the emotions, particularly emotions as things which are shared among people.

  • [2004] Interaction Ritual Chains

  • [2005] The Sociology of Almost Everything Four Questions to Randall Collins about Interaction Ritual Chains
    In: Canadian Journal of Sociology Online January-February 2005.
    Randall Collins replies to questions raised by Peter Baehr.

  • [2011] Interaction Rituals and the New Electronic Media
    In: The Sociological Eye, 25.01.2011

  • [2011] The inflation of bullying: from fagging to cyber-effervescent scapecoating
    In: The Sociological Eye, 07.06.2011

  • [2013] Goffman and Garfinkel in the intellectual life of the 20th century
    In: The Sociological Eye, 20.10.2013

  • The Sociological Eye
    The personal blog of Collins. “The sociological eye holds up a periscope above the tides of political and intellectual partisanship, spying out the patterns of social life in every direction.”

• Classroom Sociometrics
  A computer program which facilitates the collection of sociometric data in the classroom. It employs sociograms, scatter charts, and bar graphics to depict the social climate of a classroom.

• Ethnomethodology and Conversation Analysis

• Eve, Michael
  [2002] Deux traditions d’analyse des reseaux sociaux
  In: Networks 115: 183-212.
  

• Forsyth, Donelson R. - Virginia Commonwealth University, USA
  Group Dynamics
  How do groups (and individuals) cope with their failures? What basic human needs do we satify by joining together with others? How does leadership within a group emerge? These and other questions are discussed in some clearly written documents.

• Garlikov, Richard
  A Kiss is Just a Kiss — The Impossibility of Sexual Communication
  A chapter from his book “The Meaning of Love”.
  Garlikov’s argument is not that communication about or about feelings is impossible, but that communication by means of sex is impossible.

• Garton, Laura / Haythornthwaite, Caroline / Wellman, Barry
  [1997] Studying Online Social Networks
  In: Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 3(1)
  A computer network that connects people or organizations, is a social network. Yet the study of such computer-supported social networks has not received as much attention as studies of human-computer interaction, online person-to-person interaction, and computer-supported communication within small groups. The authors argue the usefulness of a social network approach for the study of computer-mediated communication. They review some basic concepts of social network analysis, describe how to collect and analyze social network data, and demonstrate where social network data can be, and have been, used to study computer-mediated communication. Throughout, they show the utility of the social network approach for studying computer-mediated communication, be it in computer-supported cooperative work, in virtual community, or in more diffuse interactions over less bounded systems such as the Internet.

• Harris, C. Dodd - House Atreides
  Symbolic Interactionism as defined by Herbert Blumer
  Blumer was one of the premier symbolic interactionists. He expounded with fervour on the importance of meaning to the individual as an acting entity, the primacy of direct empirical observation as amethodology, and the centrality of the ‘definition of the situation’ [W. I. Thomas]. This overview of Blumer’s contributions will examines the premises underlying Symbolic Interactionism, explores the ‘root images’ of Symbolic Interactionism, and concludes with a few remarks about Blumer’s assertions regarding methodology as it relates to empirical science.

• Heise, David H. - Indiana University’s Department of Sociology, USA
  Studying Social Interaction
  Heise is the originator of Affect Control Theory. His methodological research has proceeded from issues in quantitative modeling to methodological problems in qualitative research. His social psychological research focuses on the affective and logical foundations of social interaction. His site contains recent or forthcoming papers. You can download software for the analysis of social interaction and his book Causal Analysis [2001].

• Horowitz, Mardi J. - University of California, USA
  [2012] Self-Identity Theory and Research Methods
  In: Journal of Research Practice 8(2)
  Horowitz introduces the focus and methods of clinical psychodynamic research for researchers and professionals from other fields. He draws attention to the notions of self and identity, two key concepts in psychodynamic sciences. Our different experiences of self are a result of different unconscious generalizations about self becoming dominant at different times, in different social or cultural settings. These generalizations, or self-schemas, are fed by various conscious and unconscious inputs, which may be of personal or social origin. Accordingly, self-schemas need not be consistent with each other. Their overall organization (i.e., self-organization) can vary from being rather fragmented to effectively harmonious. A harmonious level of self-organization manifests in an intuitive sense of self as intending, attending, and expecting according to unified attitudes. A fragmented level of self-organization manifests in a chaos of selfhood, accompanied by a loss of emotional governance. The level of self-organization determines the identity of a person, that is, the person’s conscious or intuitive sense of sameness over time.

• Ideas on Teams and Teamwork
  A summary of many books on teams by IBM Corp. Compiled by Bob Willard. The purpose of the site is to lead those interested in leadership development to on-line resources. The material is organizaed by topics including teamwork, learning organizatyions, and systems thinking.

• Language and Social Interaction (LSI)
  A division of the National Communication Association (NCA). The scholars in this division are concerned with the utilization of speech, language, or gesture in human communication including studies of discourse processes, face-to-face interaction, communication competence, speech act theory, cognitive processing, and conversation analytic, ethnographic, ethnomethodological, and sociolinguistic scholarship.

• Moreno, Jacob Levy
  Sociometry is one of the methods of socio-psychology developed by professional psychiatrist Jacob Levi Moreno (USA) to estimate the interpersonal emotive relationships within a group (1934). The results of the sociometric study of a community can help to spot informal leaders, rank employees, identify those who are socially isolated. Sociometric methods enable one to express intragroup relations in terms of numbers, graphs and text and thereby obtain valuable information on the state of subjective psychological relationships in a group.

• NetAge: Virtual Teams
  NetAge helps people work together across boundaries of space, time and organizations using technology. The site provides information about 21st century organizations, virtual teams, teamnets, and networks.

• Network Visualization
  The Network gallery documents work in progress in efforts to visualize social structures. The aim is to develop experience how automatic procedures can be combined with aesthetics to ease insight into usually complex phenomena. There are two tracks which visitors can follow. As the visualizations stem from varying subject domains you may choose to follow the subject track, which organizes the presentation around the thematic aspects of the datasets. If your interest is more formal, you may wish to enter the technical laboratory. There they demonstrate methodological approaches for handling empirical data. This will often move quickly through various substantive domains where similar technical problems arise.

• Research Center for Group Dynamics (RCGD) - University of Michigan, USA
  A research center that advances the understanding of human behavior in a societal context. Current research includes studies concerned with group decision making and social judgment; conformity and independence; violence and aggression, scholastic achievement, delinquency, and alternative schools; social relationships and social support within African American communities, the study of aging in a variety of social contexts, studies focusing on the effects of educational television, computers, and other novel technology in classrooms; stereotyping and social judgment, culture and cognition, cognitive anthropology; human mating strategies and conflict between the sexes, and studies on the mental representation of social categories with a focus on the development of notions of race in young children.

• Research Sources on Concepts of Person and Self
  Maintained by Shaun Gallagher, University of Memphis (USA).

• Rocco, Elena - University of Trento, Italy
  Trust breaks down in electronci contexts but can be repaired by some initial face-to-face contact
  Trust is the prerequisite for success when a collaborative task involves risk of individualistic or deceitful behaviors of others. Can trust emerge in electronic contexts? This issue is explored in an experiment in which trust emergence is measured in both face-to-face and electronic contexts. In this experiment trust is revealed by the degree of cooperation the group is able to reach in solving a social dilemma, i.e. a situation in which advantages for individualistic behavior make group cooperation highly vulnerable. The experiment consists of two stages. The first stage analyzes the effects of F-t-F and electronic communication on trust Trust succeeds only with F-t-F communication. The second stage investigates whether a pre-meeting F-t-F can promote trust in electronic contexts- Results are positive. Examination of how people converse in these two contexts sheds some light on the effects of technical characteristics and social circumstances on the emergence of trust.

• Schneider, Andreas / Heise, David R. - Dep. of Sociology, Indiana Univ., USA
  [1995] Simulating Symbolic Interaction
  In: Journal of Mathematical Sociology 20: 271-87.
  A description of a program for simulating symbolic interaction. The program processes verbal inputs using empirically-based equations and a cybernetic theoretical model, while making reference to dictionaries of culture measurements. Results are verbal outputs suggesting what behaviors, emotions, attributions, and labelings will occur in the given situation.

• Scott, John
  • [2000] Social Network Analysis: A Handbook

  • [2012] What is social network analysis? [27:19] - NCRM (National Centre for Research Methods)

• Self Directed Work Teams (SDWT)
  Self Directed Work Teams are making an impact in organizations throughout the world. Why are leading-edge organizations switching from the traditional management ‘boss-worker’ model to a team ‘collaborative’ model? The site contains an extensive list of links to other sites. It also inlcudes a bibliography and links to other bibliographies on the www.

• Stets, Jan E. / Peter J. Burke
  • [2005a] Identity Verification, Control, and Aggression in Marriage
    In: Social Psychology Quarterly 68:160-178.
    A study on the identity verification process and its effects in marriage. The hypothesis is that a lack of verification in the spouse identity (1) threatens stable self-meanings and interaction patterns between spouses, and (2) challenges a (nonverified) spouse’s perception of control over the environment. In response to both of these circumstances, spouses increase control over their partners to counteract disturbances to self-in-situation meanings and to regain the perception of control over their environment. When increased control over the partner does not reaffirm one’s identity or restore the perception of control, one may use aggression to gain control. Analysis of data from newly married couples over the first two years of marriage provides results that are consistent with this thesis. The lack of identity verification is tied to the control process, leads to dysfunctional interaction patterns in marriage, and more broadly threatens a stable social structure.

  • [2005b] New Directions in Identity Control Theory
    In: Advances in Group Process 22:43-64.
    Identity control theory has long posited that there are positive emotional consequences to identity verification and negative emotional consequences to the lack of identity verification. Little work has been done to elaborate the variety of negative emotions that result for a discrepancy between meanings held in the identity standard and meanings perceived in the situation. This paper elaborates the nature of this discrepancy and hypothesizes the variety of negative emotions that arise depending upon the source of the discrepancy, the source of the identity standard, and the relative power and status of the actor and others in the situation.

  • [2014a] Social Comparison in Identity Theory
    In: Zlatan Krizan & Frederick X. Gibbons [2014] Communal Functions of Social Comparison. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 39-59.

  • [2014b] The Development of Identity Theory
    In: Advances in Group Processess 31:57-91.
    A review the historical development of identity theory from 1988 to the present, and an outline some thoughts about future directions for the theory. The authors discuss major advances in identity theory such as the incorporation of the perceptual control system into the theory, the introduction of resources in which symbolic and sign-meanings are important, new views of the social structure, the relevance of the situation in influencing the identity process, the idea of different bases of identities, broadening our understanding of multiple identities, studying identity change, and bringing in emotions into the theory.

  • [2014c] Emotions and Identity Nonverification
    In: Social Psychology Quarterly 77:387-410.
    When individuals’ identities are not verified, most theories and research suggest that they feel bad when others evaluate them more negatively than how they see themselves. It is less clear whether they feel good or bad when others evaluate them more positively than how they see themselves. Stets & Burke examine people’s emotional reactions to nonverifying feedback. Individuals feel a little better when others slightly overrate them (an enhancement effect). Individuals also feel bad for being highly overrated (a consistency effect), and this consistency effect overpowers the enhancement effect.

  • [2014d] Self-Esteem and Identities
    In: Sociological Perspectives 57:409-33.
    ct While most research examines self-esteem in terms of self-worth, Stets & Burke suggest three dimensions of self-esteem: worth-based, efficacy-based, and authenticity-based esteem. Each of these dimensions is linked to one of the three motives of the self, and each of them primarily emerges through verification of social/group, role, and person identities, respectively.

• Symbols: Encyclopaedia of Western Signs and Ideograms
  A collection of more than 2,500 Western signs, arranged into over 50 groups according to their graphic characteristics. Includes the symbols’ histories, uses, and meanings. The signs range from ideograms carved in mammoth teeth by Cro-Magnon men, to hobo signs and subway graffiti.

• Wikipedia
  • Social behavior | Social actions | Agency
  • Types of social action: Affectional action | Traditional action | Instrumental action | Value-rational action
  • Social relation / interaction | Communicative interaction | Interpersonal relationship
  • Action theory | Structure and agency | Symbolic interactionism | Structuration theory
  • Group | Group theory
  • Social Network | Network theory | Balance theory | Graph theory | Role Theory | Social comparison theory | Social identity approach

• Association for Behavior Analysis Internatioal (ABAI)
  An association dedicated to promoting the experimental, theoretical, and applied analysis of behavior.

• International Association Relationship Research (IARR)
  A scientific and professional organization focused on stimulating and supporting the scientific study of personal and social relationships. Members of IARR come from around the globe and various disciplines. The majority of members are affiliated with academic institutions, however many work in industry and/or private practice. It publishes Personal Relatioships, Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Advances in Personal Relationships, and Relationship Research News.

• International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA)
  The professional association of social network analysis. Informs on INSN, its journal, and related resources. Includes portion of recent issues of Connnections (a bulletin containing news, scholarly articles, technical columns, and abstracts and book reviews) and the journals Social Networks and the Journal of Social Stucture, the professional journal for social network researchers. A dailey updated page that provides access to network analysis software and to datasets contributed by network researchers.

• International Society for Self and Identity (ISSI)
  An international association for social and behavioral scientists dedicated to promoting the scientific study of the human self. The members of ISSI share an interest in cognitive, emotional, and behavioral processes related to the self-system. These include the ability for people to think consciously about themselves, to form images and concepts of what they are like, to evaluate their characteristics and capabilities, to plan deliberately for the future, to worry about how they are being perceived by others, and to direct their own behavior in line with personal standards. Because this ability to self-reflect has important implications for understanding behavior, the self has emerged as a central focus of theory and research in many domains of social and behavioral science.

• International Society for the Study of Personal Relationships (ISSPR)
  A professional organization interested in all aspects of personal relationships. Its goal is to stimulate and support scholarship and research on personal relationships, improve communication between researchers around the world engaged in the scientific study of personal relationships, and establish the field of personal relationships within the scholarly community.

• Social Network Analysis Study Group (SNAG) - British Sociological Association (BSA)
  SNAG aims to support sociologists interested in Social Network Analysis (SNA) within BSA, to offer an opportunity for discussion and interaction with like-minded colleagues, and to coordinate activities of common interest. Social networks are not new: people have always formed ties to one another. Online platforms (such as Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest) only offer additional channels for networked interactions to occur. Today, the analysis of social networks is much more than the visualisation of connections through visually appealing diagrams (socio-grams): it is about exploring how we connect as individuals, groups or organisations, and how our embeddedness in specific relational settings affect our lives and behaviours.

• Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction (SSSI)
  An international social science professional organization of scholars interested in qualitative, especially interactionist, research of a wide range of social issues with an emphasis on identity, everyday practice and language. Provides a set of resources for qualitative researchers. SSSI publishes the journal Symbolic Interaction.

• Vita Quotidiana - Associazione Italiana di Sociologia (AIS)
  Section of the Italian Sociological Association that is specialized in the sociology of everyday life. It fosters and support studies on biographical transitions in times full of unvertainty, and opportunities to develop reflexivity and creativity.

• Ethics & Behavior
  Publishes articles on an array of topics pertaining to various moral issues and conduct. These matters include the exercise of social and ethical responsibility in human behaviors; ethical dilemmas or professional misconduct in health and human service delivery; the conduct of research involving human and animal participants; fraudulence in the management or reporting of scientific research; and public policy issues involving ethical problems.

• Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA)
  A peer-reviewed, journal, that publishes research about applications of the experimental analysis of behavior to problems of social importance. The journal is published on behalf of the Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (SEAB) that also publishes both the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.

• Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (JEAB)
  A peer-reviewed academic journal that covers the experimental analysis of behavior.

• Journal of Nonverbal Behavior
  Publishes peer-reviewed original theoretical and empirical research papers on all major areas of nonverbal behavior. The coverage extends to paralanguage, proxemics, facial expressions, eye contact, face-to-face interaction, and nonverbal emotional expression, as well as other relevant topics which contribute to the scientific understanding of nonverbal processes and behavior.

• Journal of Social Structure (JoSS)
  An electronic journal of the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA). It is designed to facilitate timely dissemination of state-of-the-art results in the interdisciplinary research area of social structure. It publishes empirical, theoretical and methodological articles.

• Personal Relationships (PR)
  An international, interdisciplinary journal which promotes scholarship in the field of personal relationships throughout a broad range of disciplines & methodologies. The subject matter of PR includes such topics as love, jealousy, conflict, intimacy, social support, loneliness, socialization, attachment and bonding, communication, kinship, and sexuality. The journal is published by the International Society for the Study of Personal Relationships (ISSPR).

• Redes
  A Spanish magazine for social network analysis.

• Self and Identity
  Publishes articles on social and psychological processes of the self. Work on self and identity has a special place in the study of human nature, as self-concerns are arguably at the center of individuals’ striving for well-being and for making sense of one’s life. Life goals develop and are influenced by one’s view of what one is like, the way one would ideally like to be (or would like to avoid being), as well as one’s perceptions of what is feasible. Conceptions of self and the world affect how one’s progress towards these goals is monitored, evaluated, redirected, re-evaluated, and pursued again. The self as a construct has far-reaching implications for behavior, self-esteem, motivation, experience of emotions and the world more broadly, and hence for interpersonal relationships, society, and culture. The journal is sponsored by the International Society for Self and Identity (ISSI).

• Social Networks
  A journal for the study of social networks. It is an inter-disciplinary and international quarterly that provides a common forum for representatives of anthropology, sociology, history, social psychology, political science, human geography, biology, economics, communications science and other disciplines who share an interest in the structure of social relations and associations. The journal publishes theoretical, methodological and substantive papers. Articles published in the journal are all concerned with questions about the structure —or patterning— of the linkages that connect social actors. The journal is published by Elsevier on behalf of the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA).

• Small Group Research (SGR)
  A peer-reviewed bi-monthly international and interdisciplinary journal presenting research, theoretical advancements, and empirically supported applications with respect to all types of small groups. SGR addresses and connects three vital areas of study: the psychology of small groups, communication within small groups, and organizational behavior of small groups.

• Symbolic Interaction
  A quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal that covers research and theoretical developments concerned with symbolic interactionism. It is the official publication of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction (SSSI).

Software for Network Analysis

• Cytoscape
  An open source software platform for visualizing complex networks and integrating these any type of attribute data. Cytoscape was originally designed for biological research, but is now a general platform for complex network analysis and visualization. It provides a basic set of features for data integration, analysis, and visualization. A lot of Apps are available for various kinds of problem domains, including bioinformatics, social network analysis, and semantic web.

• Gephi
  An interactive visualization and exploration platform for all kinds of networks and complex systems, dynamic and hierarchical graphs. A great tool for people that have to explore and understand graphs. It runs on Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. and is open-source and free. Gephi has been used in traditional network analysis topics, but also to visualise the global connectivity of newspapers, of Twitter network traffic during social unrest.

• Igraph
  An open source and free software package for creating and manipulating undirected and directed graphs. It includes implementations for classic graph theory problems like minimum spanning trees and network flow, and also implements algorithms for some recent network analysis methods, like community structure search. It contains functions for generating regular and random graphs, manipulating graphs, assigning attributes to vertices and edges. It can calculate various structural properties, graph isomorphism, includes heuristics for community structure detection, supports many file formats.

• NetDraw
  A free Windows program for visualizing social network data.

• NetLogo
  A multi-agent programmable modeling environment for simulating natural and social phenomena. It is particularly well suited for modeling complex systems developing over time. It was authored by Uri Wilensky in 1999 and has been in continuous development ever since at the Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling at Northwestern University, USA. Students can open simulations and play with them, exploring their behavior under various conditions. It is also an authoring environment which enables students, teachers and curriculum developers to create their own models. NetLogo is simple enough for students and teachers, yet advanced enough to serve as a powerful tool for researchers in many fields.

• NetMiner
  A commercial software tool voor exploratory analysis and visualization of large network data. . It incorporates all elements of online social networks including multiple user profiles, user messaging, trending topics, and advertising. NetMiner 4 license for coursework is provided to students and teachers for free if answering a questionnaire.

• NetworKit
  An open-source toolkit for high-performance network analysis. Provides tools for the analysis of large networks in the size range from thousands to billions of edges. It implements efficient graph algorithms, many of them parallel to utilize multicore architectures. These are able to compute standard measures of network analysis, such as degree sequences, clustering coefficients and centrality. The project is developted and sponsored by Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Germany.

• NodeXL
  An open-source template for Microsoft Excel that makes it easy to explore network graphs. You can enter a network edge list in a worksheet, click a button and see your graph, all in the familiar environment of the Excel window. Presented by the Social Media Research Foundation.

• Pajek
  A free Windows program for large network analysis and visualization. Pajek is the Slovene word for Spider. The program has been developed by Vladimir Batagelj and Andrej Mrvar.

• R
  R is a language and environment for statistical computing and graphics (similar to the S language and environment which was developed by John Chambers and colleagues at Bell Laboratories). R provides a wide variety of statistical (linear and nonlinear modelling, classical statistical tests, time-series analysis, classification, clustering) and graphical techniques. The S language is often the vehicle of choice for research in statistical methodology. One of R’s strengths is the ease with which well-designed publication-quality plots can be produced, including mathematical symbols and formulae where needed.

• RCurl
  Allows to download files van web servers, post forms, use HTTPS, use persisten connections, upload files, use binary content, handle redirects, password authentication, etc.

• Tulip
  An information visualization framework dedicated to the analysis and visualization of relational data. It provides developers with a complete library, supporting the design of interactive information visualization applications for relational data that can be tailored to the problems he or she is addressing. The framework enables the development of algorithms, visual encodings, interaction techniques, data models, and domain-specific visualizations. It facilitates the reuse of components and allows developers to focus on programming their application.

• Unicet
  A Windows software package for the analysis of social network data. It was developed by Lin Freeman, Martin Everett and Steve Borgatti. Free trial period of 90 days. It comes with the NetDraw network visualization tool.

• Visone
  A software tool intended for research and teaching in social network analysis. It allows experts and novices to apply advanced visual methods.

• Wikipedia
  Social Network Analysis Software

Social Psychology

• Association Géza Róheim - Ethnopsychanalyse
  Information on the activities of the Association and online texts in relation with ethnopsychanalysis.

• CROW: Course Resources On the Web
  Resources for the teaching of socialpsychology. The site points instructors of social psychology to relevant course resources on the web such as assignments, activities, online studies, topic resources and student resources.

• Gergen, Kenneth J. - George Mason University, USA
  Social Psychology as Social Construction: The Emerging Vision.

• Kearl, Michael - Trinity University, USA
  Social Psychology
  A very good place to start for a sociological perspective on psychology.

• Kurt Lewin Institute (KLI)
  A joint venture of senior researchers in social psychology and its applications, who are affiliated to five Dutch Universities. The goal of the KLI is to stimulate and strengthen basic and applied research on human relations. More specifically, the KLI focuses on how human behaviour is influenced by dispositional, cognitive and motivational factors in different social contexts.

• Papers on Consciousness
  David Chalmers (University of Arizona, USA) created a directory of more than thousand papers on consciousness and related topicsm such as memory, learning, language, and free will.

• Personality Project
  A collection of web pages devoted to the academic study of personality. A guide for the interested student, researcher or serious layperson to recent developments in the field of personality research. Included are historical reviews of the field, links to current research findings from around the world, course syllabi on personality as well as on research methodology with a particular emphasis upon psychometric research, and tutorials to help everyone learn some of the more powerful statistical procedures used in personality research. Some pages are very technical, some are not. Some are very new, some have not been updated in several years.

• Personality Theories
  An electronic textbook created by prof. C. George Boeree, Shippenburg University, USA. Great introduction to all the scientists that contributed to the theory of personality.

• Psychology Virtual Library
  A collection of topocally organized links. The categories are: Academic Departments, Academic Psychology. Books and Publishers, Clinical Social Work, Directories of Psychology Sites, E-Mail Lists and Newsgroups, Employment & Entrepreneurship, History of Psychology, Journals, Library Resources Online, Mental Health Resources, Professional Societies, Psychology of Religion, School Psychology, Stress Management, and Transpersonal Psychology.

• PsycSite
  A public service designed to help students and professionals interested in the science of psychology find resources on the internet. A major jumping-off point for searching out psychological information. The focus is on psychology as a science (not on parapsychology or self-help). Topics ranging from social, industrial and health psychology to neuroscience and artificial intelligence. Conception and Design: Ken Stange.

• Psych Web - Russ Dewey
  Psychology-related information for students and teachers of psychology.

• Psychology Topics - American Psychological Association (APA)

• Psychology Web Sites
  Editor: William E. Snell, Department of Psychology, Southeast Missouri State University, USA.

• Social Psychology Network (SPN)
  One of the most comprehensive source of social psychology information on the internet. SPN is an educational organization with over 10,500 members worldwide. Founded by Scott Plous (Wesleyan University, USA) in 1996.

• Vaknin, Shmuel - Israel
  • Self Love and Narcissism
    “The narcissist is an actor enacting a monodrama, yet forced to remain behind the scenes. The scenes take center stage, instead. The Narcissist does not cater at all to his own needs. Contrary to his reputation, the Narcissist does not ‘love’ himself in any true sense of this loaded word. He feeds off other people who hurl back at him an image that he projects to them. This is their sole function in his world: to reflect, to admire, to applaud, to detest - in a word, to assure him that he exists.”

  • Narcism as a Glance
    Primary Narcissism is a defense mechanism, common in the formative years (6 months to 6 years old). It is intended to shield the infant and toddler from the inevitable hurt and fears involved in the individuation-separation phase of personal development. Secondary or pathological narcissism is a pattern of thinking and behaving in adolescence and adulthood, which involves infatuation and obsession with one's self to the exclusion of others. It manifests in the chronic pursuit of personal gratification and attention (narcissistic supply), in social dominance and personal ambition, bragging, insensitivity to others, lack of empathy and/or excessive dependence on others to meet his/her responsibilities in daily living and thinking. Pathological narcissism is at the core of narcissistic personality disorder.

• Wikipedia
  • Social psychology | Sociological approach to social psychology
  • Understanding Self and Identity | Outline of self | Self-concept | Self-scheme | Self-image | Self-esteem | Self-concealment | Selfism | Psychology of self | Identity | Identity formation
  • Personality psychology | Differential psychology
  • Crowd / Mob psychology | Mobbing
  • Collective consciousness | Group think | Collective narcissism
  • Group dynamics

• Asian Association of Social Psychology (AASP)
  Provides scholars in Asia and the Pacific with a collaborative forum for the discussion, promotion, capabilities building, and publication of their research. It promotes research on Asian traditions, philosophies, and ideas that have scientific merit and practical applications, and expands the boundary, substance, and direction of social psychology by supplementing and integrating Western psychology’s focus on intra-individual processes with a broader and more holistic view from culture and society.

• Association for Psychological Science (APS)
  An international non-profit organization that promotes, protects, and advances the interests of scientifically oriented psychology in research, application, teaching, and the improvement of human welfare.

• Association for Research in Personality (ARP)
  A scientific organization devoted to bringing together scholars whose research contributes to the understanding of personality structure, processes, and development. ARP organizes a biennial conference, publishes a newsletter and two journals: Journal of Research in Personality, and Social Psychological and Personality Science.

• British Psychological Society (BPS)
  Specialized on the scientific stufy of people, the mind and behavior. The representative body for psychology and psychologists in the United Kingdom.

• European Association of Personality Psychology (EAPP)
  Promotes and develops empirical and theoretical personality psychology within Europe and the interchange of information relating between members of the EAPP and cognate associations throughout the world.

• European Association of Psychological Assessment (EAPA)
  A non-profit organization for people with a University degree (or equivalent) who are working in the area of psychological assessment. EAPA covers a broad variety of topics, such as diagnostic processes, assessment of personality, intelligence, and behavior, observational and neuropsychological assessment as well as assessment in the different applied fields such as clinical and health, education, work or evaluation research.

• European Association of Social Psychology (EASP)
  EASP promotes excellence in European research in the field of social psychology. To this end it sets up a large variety of activities and it creates publication outlets for significant research contributions. It contributes to the scientific communication among European social psychologists as well as between Europe and Social Psychology in the world at large.

• Fachgruppe Differentielle Psychologie, Persönlichkeitspsychologie und Psychologische Diagnostik - Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychologie (DGPS)
  Section Differential Psychology, Personality Psychology and Psychological Diagnostics of the German Psychological Association. Promotes the personality psychological, differential psychological and psycho-diagnostic research in German speaking countries.

• Iberoamerican Association for Individual Differences Research (AIIDI)
  AIIDI promotes the research of inter and intra-individual differences, and inter-groups’ differences, in intelligence, aptitudes, skills, temperament and personality, from an empirical standpoint.

• International Association of Language and Social Psychology (IALSP)
  The primary purpose of the Association is to ensure the continuity and development of the biennial international conferences and the variety of functions these have served: the exchange of ideas; the making of contacts; the facilitation of collaborative research projects; the publication of articles and books; and especially, the sharing of experience among colleagues from a variety of disciplines and professions from around the world.

• National Association for Self-Esteem (NASE)
  An American association devoted to fully integrate self-esteem into the fabric of society so that every individual, no matter what their age or background, experiences personal worth and happiness.

• Research Committee on Social Psychology (RC42) - International Sociological Association (ISA)

• Section on Social Psychology - American Sociological Association

• Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP)
  You can read the newsletter in psychology, join an electronic mailing list, and browse resources for personality and social psychologists.

• Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI)
  An international group of over 3500 psychologists, students and others who share a common interest in research on the psychological aspects of important social issues.

• Society of Experimental Social Psychology (SESP)
  A scientific organization dedicated to the advancement of social psychology.

• Sociology, Psychoanalysis and the Psychosocial Study Group - British Sociological Association (BSA)
  A forum for anyone interested in the relationship between sociology and psychoanalysis, and the sociological investigation of the psychosocial. Psychosocial inquiry involves an attempt to think through the multiple ways in which human subjectivities, psychic life, and material and social worlds are implicated in each other, mutually constitutive or co-produced. Although psychoanalysis is not the only resource drawn upon in these debates, it is undoubtedly one of the major sources for psychosocial thinking.

• World Association for Personality Psychology (WAPP)
  The association for those interested in or working in the areas of personality, individuality, intelligence, and individual differences in a broad sense, including studies with a cultural or cross-cultural content. The goal of the WAPP is the advancement and development of empirical and theoretical personality psychology worldwide, fostering the exchange of information between persons and between regionally operating organizations in the same field anywhere in the world, and furthering cooperation and linkage between the association and other organizations with similar goals.

• Asian Journal of Social Psychology (AJSP)
  Stimulates research and encourages academic exchanges for the advancement of social psychology in Asia. It publishes theoretical and empirical papers by Asian scholars and those interested in Asian cultures and societies.

• Basic and Applied Social Psychology (BASP)
  Publishes of research articles, literature reviews, criticism, and methodological or theoretical statements spanning the entire range of social psychological issues. The journal publishes basic work in areas of social psychology that can be applied to societal problems, as well as direct application of social psychology to such problems.

• British Journal of Social Psychology (BJSP)
  Publishes original papers in all areas of social psychology including: social cognition, attitudes, group processes, social influence, intergroup relations, self and identity, nonverbal communication, social psychological aspects of personality, affect and emotion, language and discourse. BJSP is the flagship journal of the British Psychological Society (BPS).

• Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology (CRSP)
  International forum for pre-registered social psychological research published by Taylor & Francis/Routledge. Pre-registration is a publication method that guarantees publication independent of results if the planned and registered protocol is being followed. It is published in three volumes per year.

• Current Research in Social Psychology (CRISP)
  A peer reviewed, electronic journal covering all aspects of social psychology. Publication is sponsored by the Center for the Study of Group Processes at the University of Iowa which provides free access to its contents. Editors: Michael J. Lovaglia (University of Iowa) and Shane Soboroff (Eastern Illinois University).

• Evolutionary Psychology (EP)
  An international journal of evolutionary approaches to psychology and behavior. EP aims to foster communication between experimental and theoretical work, on the one hand, and historical, conceptual and interdisciplinary writings acroos the whole range of the biological and human sciences, on the other.

• European Journal of Social Psychology (EJSP)
  An international forum for high quality, peer reviewed, original research in all areas of social psychology and from all parts of the world. It encourages submissions that provide a significant contribution to the understanding of social psychological phenomena and are based on empirical, meta-analytical or theoretical research. Methodological contributions to social psychology are also welcome. The journal is sponsored by the European Association of Social Psychology (EASP).

• European Monographs in Social Psychology (EMSP)
  Published in conjunction with the European Association of Social Psychology (EASP), to support authored books for advanced students covering social topics that promote a European intellectual perspective to the rest of the world.

• European Review of Social Psychology (ERSP)
  An international open-submission review journal, published under the auspices of the European Association of Social Psychology (EASP). It provides an outlet for substantial, theory-based reviews of empirical work addressing the full range of topics covered by the field of social psychology. Potential authorship is international, and papers are edited with the help of an international editorial board.

• Global Observer (GO)
  The Global Observer educates and informs the Association for Psychological Science (APS) on matters affecting the research, academic, and applied disciplines of psychology; promotes the scientific values of APS Members; reports and comments on issues of national interest to the psychological scientist community; and provides a vehicle for the dissemination of information on APS. It is published 10 times per year.

• Journal of Applied Social Psychology (JASP)
  A monthly peer-reviewed academic journal devoted to applications of experimental research to the problems of society (e.g. health, safety, gender, law).

• Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology (JCASP)
  Publishes papers which advance the contribution of psychology to understanding and addressing community and social issues. The journal has a particular interest in developing psychology through working with these issues in real world settings and in advancing the capacity of community and social psychology to promote social justice and social inclusion.

• Journal of Experimental Social Psychology (JESP)
  A peer-reviewed academic journal covering social psychology published on behalf of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology (SESP). It publishes original research and theory on human social behavior and related phenomena. The journal emphasizes empirical, conceptually based research that advances an understanding of important social psychological processes.

• Journal of Language and Social Psychology (JLS)
  A peer-reviewed internatinal journal devoted to the social psychology of language. JLS provides complete and balanced coverage of the latest research and theory at the cross-roads of language, mind, and society. It is published on behalf of the International Association of Language and Social Psychology (IALSP).

• Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (JPSP)
  A monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the American Psychological Association (APA) that was established in 1965. It covers the fields of social and personality psychology. PSP examines the role of social cognitions, processes & personality factors in applied settings, including work, society, & culture. It encourages work relating to social & digital media, aesthetics & the arts, organizations & leadership and more.

• Journal of Research in Personality (JRP)
  A peer-reviewed academic journal covering the field of personality psychology. It publishes articles that examine important issues in the field of personality and in related fields basic to the understanding of personality. The subject matter includes treatments of genetic, physiological, motivational, learning, perceptual, cognitive, and social processes of both normal and abnormal kinds in human and animal subjects. JRP is the official journal of the Association for Research in Personality (ARP).

• Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology (JSCP)
  A journal devoted to the application of theory and research from social psychology toward the better understanding of human adaptation and adjustment, including both the alleviation of psychological problems and distress (psychopathology) and the enhancement of psychological well-being among the psychologically healthy. Topics of interest include traditionally defined psychopathology (depression), common emotional and behavioral problems in living (conflicts in close relationships), the enhancement of subjective well-being, and the processes of psychological change in everyday life (self-regulation) and professional settings (psychotherapy and counseling).

• Journal of Social and Political Psychology (JSPP)
  A peer-reviewed open-access journal that publishes articles at the intersection of social and political psychology from different epistemological, methodological, theoretical, and cultural perspectives and from different regions across the globe that substantially advance the understanding of social problems, their reduction, and the promotion of social justice.

• Journal of Social Issues (JSI)
  The flagship journal of Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI). JSI covers a wide range of pressing social issues concerning education, health, intergroup relations, politics, poverty, religion, technology, and the workplace.

• Journal of Social Psychology (JSP)
  JSP publishes original empirical research in all areas of basic and applied social psychology. Most articles report laboratory or field research in core areas of social and organizational psychology including the self and social identity, person perception and social cognition, attitudes and persuasion, social influence, consumer behavior, decision making, groups and teams, stereotypes and discrimination, interpersonal attraction and relationships, prosocial behavior, aggression, organizational behavior, leadership, and cultural psychology.

• Personality and Social Psychology (PSP)
  Publishes work on the description, assessment, and explanation of personality and individual differences at various levels (neurobiological, cognitive, developmental, emotional-motivational). In addition, it covers all aspects of social psychology, including self and identity, interpersonal and intergroup relations, nonverbal communication, attitudes, stereotypes and other forms of social cognition. It also welcomes research that examines the role of social cognitions, processes and personality factors in applied settings, including work, society, and culture, and thus encourages work relating to social and digital media, aesthetics and the arts, organizations and leadership, product design and ergonomics, as well as work bearing on legal, ethical, political, and gender issues.

• Social Cognition (SC)
  The official journal of the International Social Cognition Network (ISCON) provides a resource for researchers as well as students. It features reports on self-perception, self-concept, social neuroscience, person-memory integration, social schemata, the development of social cognition, and the role of affect in memory and perception.

• Social Psychological and Personality Science (SPPS)
  A quarterly journal with short reports in social and personality psychology. It publishes cutting-edge, short reports of single studies, or very succinct reports of multiple studies.

• Social Psychology
  Publishes innovative and methodologically sound research and serves as an international forum for scientific discussion and debate in the field of social psychology. Topics include all basic social psychological research themes, methodological advances in social psychology, as well as research in applied fields of social psychology. The journal focuses on original empirical contributions to social psychological research, but is open to theoretical articles, critical reviews, and replications of published research.

• Social Psychology Quarterly (SPQ)
  A peer review academic journal that publishes theoretical and empirical papers on social psychology. This includes the study of the relations of individuals to one another, as well as to groups, collectivities, and institutions. It also includes the study of intra-individual processes as they substantially influence, or are influenced by, social structure and process. SPQ published on behalf of the American Sociological Association (ASA).

Psychology of Cyberspace

• Barak, Azy - University of Haifa, Israel
  • [2010] The psychological role of the Internet in mass disasters: Past evidence and future planning
    In: A. Brunet, A. R. Ashbaugh, & C. F. Herbert (eds.) [2010] Internet use in the aftermath of trauma. Amsterdam: NATO Science Series, IOS Press. pp. 23-43.
    Occasional national and international traumas and disasters may affect large numbers of people worldwide. In well-known incidents in the past decade (such as the death of Princess Diana, the tsunami in South-East Asia, Hurricane Katrina, the Pakistan-Kashmir earthquake, and the World Trade Center terror attack) hundreds of millions people went through intense emotions of fear, panic, despair, depression, and anxiety. The internet provided many of these people with an effective means of psychological relief. Research conducted on such mass traumas has documented the feasibility and effectiveness of Internet-assisted activities in helping people mentally survive the aftermath of such unusual circumstances. Barak reviews these research reports and identifies specific types and modalities characterizing the online provision of emotional relief. He proposes to preemptively construct mass disaster-specific web portals that could be operated at times of need and provide numerous effective services. International organizations should consider the initiation and establishment of such institutionalized infrastructures to harness the internet’s ability to meet a population’s psychological needs in the event of unpredicted mass-disaster.

  • [2010] Internet-supported psychological testing and assessment
    In: R. Kraus, G. Stricker, & C. Speyer (eds.) [2010] Online counseling: A handbook for mental health professionals. San Diego, CA: Elsevier. 2nd ed., pp. 225-255.

  • [2012] (with Noam Lapidot-Lefter) Effects of anonymity, invisibility, and lack of eye-contact on toxic online disinhibition
    In: Computers in Human Behavior 28:434-443.
    A study on the impact of three typical online communication factors on inducing the toxic online disinhibition effect: anonymity, invisibility, and lack of eye-contact. The authors examine the extent to which these factors lead to flaming behaviors, the typical products of online disinhibition. Random pairs of participants were presented with a dilemma for discussion and a common solution through online chat. The effects were measured using participants’ self-reports, expert judges’ ratings of chat transcripts, and textual analyses of participants’ conversations. The results suggested that of the three independent variables, lack of eye-contact was the chief contributor to the negative effects of online disinhibition. Consequently, it appears that previous studies might have defined the concept of anonymity too broadly by not addressing other online communication factors, especially lack of eye-contact, that impact disinhibition. The findings are explained in the context of an online sense of unidentifiability, which apparently requires a more refined view of the components that create a personal sense of anonymity.

  • [2015] (with Noam Lapidot-Lefter) The benign online disinhibition effect: Could situational factors induce self-disclosure and prosocial behaviors? | pdf
    In: Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 9(2)
    The author examined the effects of three online situational factors —anonymity, invisibility, and lack of eye contact— on inducing self-disclosure and prosocial behaviors as expressions of benign online disinhibition. Random pairs of adult strangers discussed a dilemma and were required to reach a joint solution using online chat. Self-disclosure and prosocial behavior effects were measured using participants’ self-reports, expert judges’ ratings of chat transcripts, and textual analyses of the conversations. Results suggest that the interaction between anonymity and invisibility had a significant effect on the revealing of emotions. Lack of eye contact, the interaction between anonymity and invisibility and the interaction between lack of eye contact and invisibility had a significant effect on the inducement of first-person words. The interaction between anonymity, invisibility and lack of eye contact had significant effects on the total self-disclosure score, yet no significant effects were found for prosocial behaviors. Different factors play a role in the inducement of benign vs. toxic online disinhibition effects.

• Barak, Azy / Suler, John
  [2008] Reflections on the Psychology and Social Science of Cyberspace
  In: A. Barak (ed.) [2008] Psychological aspects of cyberspace: Theory, research, applications. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp. 1-12.

• Bruckman, Amy S. - School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
  • [1992] Identity Workshop: Emergent Social and Psychological Phenomena in Text-Based Virtual Reality. An introduction to the different kinds of MUDs, and social phenomena typical of each kind. The paper introduces issues of representations of self and how MUDs form a kind of “identity workshop”; the notion of MUDs as an evocative medium (by being between reality and unreality, MUDs often encourage people to reflect on the nature of reality); gender issues that arise in MUDs, and explores the topic of MUD addiction.

  • [1994] Approaches to Managing Deviant Behavior in Virtual Communities
    In: Proceedings of CHI 1994 (Boston, MA, April 24-April 27, 1994). New York: Association for Computing Machinery.

  • [2006] Teaching Students to Study Online Communities Ethically
    In: Journal of Information Ethics 15(2): 82-98

  • [2006] A New Perspective on “Community” and its Implications for Computer-Mediated Communication Systems
    In: Works in Progress, Extended Abstracts, Proceedings of CHI 2006, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, April 2006.

• Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking (DBLP)
  A peer-reviewed journal for understanding the social and psychological impact of today’s social networking practices. Editor-in-Chief: Brenda K. Wiederhold.
  • [01.01.2015] How Are Important Life Events Disclosed on Facebook? Relationships with Likelihood of Sharing and Privacy - Jennifer L. Bevan, Megan B. Cummings, Ashley Kubiniec, Megan Mogannam, Madison Price & Rachel Todd
    How do people post important life events on Facebook? A study of an aspect of Facebook disclosure that has as yet gone unexplored: whether a user prefers to share information directly, for example, through status updates, or indirectly, via photos with no caption or relationship status changes without context or explanation. Results show that when positive life events were shared, users preferred to do so indirectly, whereas negative life events were more likely to be disclosed directly. Privacy shared little association with how information was shared.

  • [02.02.2015] Association Between Pornography Use and Sexual Risk Behaviors in Adult Consumers: A Systematic Review - Emily L. Harkness, Baarbara Mullan & Alex Blaszczynski
    Are pornography users more likely to exhibit unsafe sexual behaviors? Is there an association exists between sexual risk behaviors and pornography consumption. For both internet pornography and general pornography, links with greater unsafe sex practices and number of sexual partners were identified.

  • [08.03.2015] The Use of Social Networking Sites for Relationship Maintenance in Long-Distance and Geographically Close Romantic Relationships - Cherrie Joy Billedo, Peter Kerkhof & Catrin Finkenauer
    Are social networks helpful or harmful in long-distance romantic relationships (LDRR)? Social networking sites (SNS) play an increasingly important role in maintaining geographically close romantic relationships (GCRR). This study examines the relative importance of SNS in maintaining LDRR compared to GCRR, particularly with regard to the use of SNS to express involvement (via relational maintenance behaviors) and to gauge a partner’s involvement (via partner surveillance and jealousy) in the relationship. Results show that participants who were in a LDRR reported higher levels of relational maintenance behaviors through SNS than participants who were in a GCRR. As compared to participants who were in a GCRR, participants who were in a LDRR used SNS more for partner surveillance and experienced higher levels of SNS jealousy.

  • [13.06.2015] Frequent Use of Social Networking Sites Is Associated with Poor Psychological Functioning Among Children and Adolescents - Hugues Sampasa-Kanyinga Hugues & Rosamund F. Lewis
    Social networking sites (SNSs) have gained substantial popularity among youth in recent years. However, the relationship between the use of these Web-based platforms and mental health problems in children and adolescents is unclear. This study investigates the association between time spent on SNSs and unmet need for mental health support, poor self-rated mental health, and reports of psychological distress and suicidal ideation. Students who reported unmet need for mental health support were more likely to report using SNSs for more than 2 hours every day than those with no identified unmet need for mental health support. Daily SNS use of more than 2 hours was also independently associated with poor self-rating of mental health and experiences of high levels of psychological distress and suicidal ideation. The findings suggest that students with poor mental health may be greater users of SNSs. They also indicate an opportunity to enhance the presence of health service providers on SNSs in order to provide support to youth.

  • [08.09.2015] Romantic Partner Monitoring After Breakups: Attachment, Dependence, Distress, and Post-Dissolution Online Surveillance via Social Networking Sites - Fox Jesse & Robert S. Tokunaga
    Romantic relationship dissolution can be stressful, and social networking sites make it difficult to separate from a romantic partner online as well as offline. Commitment predicts emotional distress after the breakup. Distress predicts partner monitoring immediately following the breakup, particularly for those who did not initiate the breakup, as well as current partner monitoring. Given their affordances, social media are discussed as potentially unhealthy enablers for online surveillance after relationship termination.

  • [10.10.2015] Facebook or Memory: Which Is the Real Threat to Your Relationship? - Michelle Drouin, Daniel A. Miller & Jayson L. Dibble
    A study on the role of Facebook friends lists in identifying potential sexual and committed relationship alternatives and the effects this had on relationship investment. The authors conclude that Facebook friends lists do act as memory primers for potential partners, but only for sexual partners, and that the effect is stronger for men than it is for women. However, identifying potential partners through Facebook actually lowers a person’s perceptions of the quality of their alternatives. In contrast, merely thinking about potential alternatives from one’s social sphere lowered relationship satisfaction and commitment with one’s current committed partner.

  • [27.10.2015] Virtual Reality Body Swapping: A Tool for Modifying the Allocentric Memory of the Body - Silvia Serino, Elisa Pedroli, Anouk Keizer e.o
    Embodiment of a virtual body via visuo-tactile stimulation can lead to an altered perception of body and object size. This study investigates whether virtual reality (VR) body swapping can be an effective tool for modifying the enduring memory of the body.

  • [06.11.2015] Sexting Among Married Couples: Who Is Doing It, and Are They More Satisfied? - Brandon T. McDaniel & Michelle Drouin
    A study on the prevalence and correlates of sexting (i.e., sending sexual messages via mobile phones). Married adults do sext each other, but it is much less common than within young adult relationships, and consists mainly of sexy or intimate talk rather than sexually explicit photos or videos. Sending sexy talk messages is positively related to relationship satisfaction only among those with high levels of avoidance, and sending sexually explicit pictures was related to satisfaction for men, and for women with high levels of attachment anxiety. Additionally, sending sexually explicit pictures was related to greater ambivalence among both men and women.

• DeAngelis, Tori
  Is Internet addiction real?
  In: Monitor on Psychology, 31(3), April 2000.
  Many psychologists doubt that addiction is the right term to describe what happens to people when they spend ‘too much’ time online. It is misleading to characterize behaviors as ‘addictions’ on the basis that peole say they do too much of them. Has it been established that there is a disorder of internet-addication that is separable from problems such as loneliness or probleem gambling, or that a passion for using the internet is ‘long-lasting’? How do we handel the paradox that the internet is a socially connecting device that can be socially isolating at the same time?

• Egger, Oliver / Rauterberg, Matthias - Institute for Hyhiene and Applied Physiology, Zurich, Switzerland
  Internet Behavior and Addiction [1996]
  A Swiss survey on Internet addiction. 10% of the respondents considered themselves as addicted to or dependent on the internet. The main results of this project are summarized in: Rauterberg, M. [1996] Süchtig nach dem Internet? - Computer, 7&8: 14-17.

• Hoffmann, Ute
  [1997] Not Without a Body? Bodily Functions in Cyberspace
  6th International IFIP-Conference on Women, Work and Computerization (WWC).
  It has become common knowledge that the technologies of cyberspace remove us from our body and the embodied world. Yet, in a somewhat ironic turn of history, the very same technologies have fuelled an expanding interest in the nature of embodiment.

• King, Storm A. - Pacific Graduate School of Psychology
  • Psychology of Cyberspace
    “Cyberspace. The space between our terminals? Or a place in our minds? ... What we think and how we act and the relationships between the two. Our thoughts influence our behavior, our behavior influences our thoughts. Either way, the opportunity to know what other individuals are thinking, and to share ones own thoughts far and wide, has never been at a higher level. The implications are astounding. Just how this new interconnectivity, where geographic constraints are abolished, will influence individual and social behavior is unclear, but we know it will.” The site presents essays and articles written by King. Subjects are: internet addication, internet gambling and pornography, support groups for recovering addicts, suicidal ideation in virtual support groups, ethical guidelines for on-line therapy. The site also contains a resource list on the psychology of virtual communities and a large collection of humorous notes.

  • [1996] Is the Internet Addictive, or are Addicts Using the Internet?
    Some internet users spend so much time logged on that their personal and/or professional life suffers. Alomost anyone has met or heared annactdocal accounts of someome who has been ‘hooked on the net’ to a point that they ignore important personal responsibilities. In this paper the current research findings are reviewd, and an attempt is made to explore some the possible explanations of this phenomena. Factors that are inherent in online interactivity — an might contribute to developing an Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD) — are distinguished from factors inherent in the people proposed to be most at risk for. or suffering from an internet addiction disorder. Recommendations for affected individuals are offered.

  • [1998] Internet therapy and self help groups — the pros and cons
    Mental health professionals are pioneering new services that offer to establish a therapeutic relationship over the internet. And we know that many people are dedicated to assist people to use the internet to find such information and how to connect to cyberspace forums dedicated to various mental health topics. But we know very little about the fenomena that many people are choosing to use the internet to seek therapeutic interventions and peer support. In this article the self-help resources and online therapy is analysed in the perspective of how the internet can ethically be used tu assist tratment of emotional and mental disorders. The unique ethical dilemmas facing researchers in this field are illustrated in an analysis of the protocols and methodologies which are use to analyse the value of self help and therapy online.

  • [2000] The Two Faces of the Internet: Introduction to the Special Issue on the Internet and Sexuality (with Azy Barak)
    In: CyberPsychology & Behavior, 3(4):517-520.
    The internet has two faces, positive and negative. Its positive aspect is that it enables the enrichment and improvement of human functioning in many areas, including health, education, commerce, and entertainment. On its negative side, the internet may provide a threatening environment and expose individuals to great risks. Paralleling this overall dual perspective, the internet facilitates sexual exploration, education, and pleasure; on the other hand, it furnishes an opportunity for criminal and other negative and harmful sexual conduct.

• Orzack, Maressa Hech - McLean Hispital, Belmont, MA, USA
  Computer Addication Services
  Computer addiction has been identified (in terms of psychological and physical symptoms) and can be treated. Dr. Orzack believes that one of the most effective methods to deal with all these types of problems is Cognitive Behavior Therapy, which teaches the patient to identify the problem, to sole the problem and to learn coping skills to prevent relapse (often the treatment is helped by medication). In addition she recommends support groups for the other affected persons. She does not treat online. The site offers some general information on computer addiction, and an informative FAQ with answers on questions like: what is computer addiction, who are the people who come to see you, why is computer addiction now a problem, how do you diagnose computer addication, and how do you treat computer addiction?

• Suler, John - Department of Psychology, Rider University, USA
  • [1996-2007] Psychology of Cyberspace
    A hypertext book that explores the psychological dimensions of the environments created by computers and online networks. It preents an evolving conceptual framework for understanding the various psychological components of cyberspace and how people react to and behave within it. Suler and his students use this framework as a basis for our ongoing research on the psychology of cyberspace or simply «cyberpsychology». This hypertext book oroignally was created in January 1996 and is continually revised and expanded. On the 10th annyversary of this project Suler wrote The Fist Decade of CyberPsychology.

  • Computer and Cyberspace Addiction
    An examination of the multiple definitions. Suler clarifies several common warning signs of computer/Internet addiction.

  • Why This Thing Eating My Live? Computer and Cyberspace Addiction at the “Palace”
    An examination of the Palace, a forum which provides graphical interface where participants create personal avatars which interact among other avatars in a visually rich environment, known as the Graphical Multi-User (K)onversation - or GMUK. These GMUKs are similar to the familiar, text-only chat environments, except you interact with people in a visual scene with little graphical icons (avatars) to represent yourself. The Palace; is an excellent example of a GMUK. Suller examines why some people might become addicted to that type of environment in terms of how this activity fulfills all of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

  • Internet Addiction in a Nutshell
    Howard Rheingold asked Suler’s opinion of the media’s coverage of ‘internet addiction’. He breaks down the answer to the internet addiction in three part. The largest group of addicts are ghosts, which only exist in the minds of the media (that love to hype and scandalize) and of luddites (who fear the unstoppable power of the internet). The second group just get caught up in the excitment and novelty of the many fascinating opportunities the internet offers. They might cause problems in their local world, but it is a phase. They realize what they can and can't get out of cyberspace, and might return to the local world a bit wiser. The last group, a minority, are the unfortunate who succumg to one or more of the many seductions of the internet, and who are unable to help themselves. The keywords for a healthy internet use als balance and integration: try to find a balance between the time you invest in online relationships with the time invested in local relationships.

  • Bringing Online and Offline Living Together
    One of the principles in psychology is the importance of integration: the fitting together and balancing of the various elements of the psyche to make a satisfaying and more or less harmonous whole. We are as healthy as we are able to realize a kind of balance betwee te contradictory emotional drives of our personal life. We seem to need a minimal balance between our conflicting needs and ambitions in order to survive. How can we reach a balance between our online and offline lives? How bad is it to experience a split between online and offline living and the compartmentalizing of one’s identifications?

• Young, Kimberly - University of Pittsburgh at Bradford, USA
  • Center for Internet Addiction
    The center answers FAQs, posts research articles on internet addiction, provides a professional directory for locating further information, and offers personal counseling services for internet addicts and their families.

  • Internet Addiction among Children: Prevention and Parenting Strategies
    Many parents get angry when they see the signs of internet addiction in their child and take the computer away as a form of punishment. Others become frightened and force their child to quit cold turkey, believing that is the only way to get rid of the problem. Both approaches invite trouble: your child will internalize the message that they are bad; they will look at you as the enemy instead of an ally; and they will suffer real withdrawal symptoms of nervousness, anger, and irritability. Instead, work with your child to establish clear boundaries for limited internet usage. Allow perhaps an hour per night after homework, with a few extra weekend hours. Stick to your rules and remember that you’re not simply trying to control him or her — you are working to free them of a psychological dependence.

  • Surfing not Studying: Dealing with Internet Addiction on Campus
    A review of the impact of cyber-abuse on college students and an outline of effective strategies to cope with this emergent campus dilemma.

  • Is Sexting Cheating?
    “Adultery is aldultery, even is its virtual. It is just as sinful as the real thing” - that is the conservative catholic version. It all depends on how do we define «infidelity». Adultery is often based upon moral judgments rather than factual information, independently formed through social conventions, religious teachings, family upbringing, reading books, and life experiences. So before anyone can answer the question, “is cheating online real?”, we need to first define what is meant by the term adultery and what constitutes sex outside of marriage? This is the definition: “Sexting becomes adultery when one person in the relationship does it without consent from a partner and without concern for how he or she will feel about it. Concealing a relationship outside of the primary one means that lying and hiding are involved, and at the moment, there is very little, if any, regard for how the other person will feel about that outside relationship. The lying and secrecy associated online affairs will destroy a couple’s trust and commitment. Trust is sacred in any relationship, and once that trust is broken, it is hard to repair.”

  • Quizzes for Internet Addication
    Several tests to determine if you are addicted to the internet, to cybersex, gaming, auctions or cyberporn, or to online gambling. It also includes a test for spouses or partners of potential internet addicts.

  • Drug Treatment for Internet Addiction
    The purpose of this study was to determine whether Lexapro (Escitalopram) is safe and effective in treating problematic internet use. Many individuals experience marked distress and functional impairments as a result of their perceived inability to control their ‘non-essential’ (non-job/school related) use of the internet. Frequently these people develop a preoccupation with the internet, a need for escape to the internet, and increasing irritability when trying to cut back use of the internet. Patients with internet addiction usually respond to serotonin reuptake inhibitors within 12 weeks.

  • [1996] Internet Addiction: The Emergence of a New Disorder
    Paper presented at the 104th annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Toronto, Canada, August 15, 1996. Published in: CyberPsychology & Behavior 1(3):237-244.
    An attempt to differentiate addictive from normal use of the Internet. It documents significant behavioral and functional differences between those subjects classified as addicts and non-addicts. She discusses clinical and social implications of pathological Internet use and future directions for research.

  • [1996] Addictive Use of the Internet: A Case that Breaks the Stereotype
    In: Psychological Reports 79:899-902.
    Contrary to the stereotype of a young, male, computer-savvy on-line user as the prototypic internet ‘addict’, new consumers of the internet who do not match this general stereotype are just as susceptible.

  • [1997] What Makes the Internet Addictive: Potential Explanations for Pathological Internet Use
    Discussion of the psychological reinforcement of increased social support, engagement in unforbidden sexual fantasies through cybersex, and the ability to reinvent oneself through on-line personas that provide potential explanations for addictive Internet use. Paper presented at the 105th annual conference of the American Psychological Association, August 15, 1997, Chicago, IL.

  • [1998] The Relationship Between Depression and Internet Addiction (with Robert C. Rodgers)
    In: CyberPsychology & Behavior 1(1):25-28.
    An empirical study on the correlation between rates of depression with pathological internet use. The findings suggest that increased levels of depression are associated with those who become addicted to the internet: depression is significantly associated with increased levers of personal internet use. This result should be interpreted with caution. It is likely that low self-esteem, poor motivation, fear of rejection, and the need for approval associated with depressives contribute to increased internet use. It is plausible that depressives are drawn to electronic communication because of the anonymous cover granted to them by talking with other through fictitious handles, which helps them overcome real-life interpersonal difficulties.

  • [1999] Cyber-Disorders: The Mental Health Concern for the New Millennium (with Molly Pistner. James O'Mara and Jennifer Buchanon)
    Paper presented at 107th APA convention, August 20, 1999.
    A survey among therapists who have treated clients suffering from cyber-related problems. It results in information on incidence rates (specified in subtypes of internet addiction) and treatment strategies.

  • [1999] Cybersex and Infidelity Online: Implications for Evaluation and Treatment (with James O'Mara and Jennifer Buchanon)
    Paper presented at the 107th annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, August 21, 1999.
    A description of warning signs of cyberaffairs and their dramatic impact on marital separation and divorce. The underlying cyber-cultural issues that increase the risk of virtual adultery are explained with the ACE Model (Anonimity, Convenience, Escape).

  • [1999] Internet Addiction: Symptoms, Evaluation, and Treatment
    In: L. VandeCreek & T. L. Jackson (eds.) [1999] Innovations in Clinical Practice (Volume 17). Sarasota, FL: Professional Resource Press.
    Discusses the complications to diagnosis of internet addiction and evaluates procedure to assess for this disorder, and several treatment strategies for recovery.

  • [2005] Profiling Online Sex Offenders, Cyber-Predators, And Pedophiles
    In: Journal of Behavioral Profiling 5(1).
    with suspected sex offenders whose criminal conduct originated from Internet use, This paper examines the role of cyberspace in the development of virtual sex offending cases. It differentiates patterns of online behavior of virtual sex offenders from classic pedophilia is presented. Virtual offenders are more likely to suffer from an addictive disorder motivated by an attempt to use sexual fantasies as a way to escape problems in their lives, acknowledging the exploitative features and harm or pain they inflict. Classic offenders make a conscious attempt to use children for self-gratification driven by a need for power, dominance, control, revenge, or anger, denying the exploitative features and harm and pain they inflict. Young presents the behavior patterns that differentiate each type of online sex offender and examines the role of internet-enabled pathology, or online sexual compulsivity, in the development of online sexual misconduct. Understanding the psychological issues involved in online sexual misconduct will assist law enforcement and cyber-crime units in developing more accurate indicators for pedophile profiling online and will help court systems better understand internet-enabled pathology and its role in criminal conduct.

  • [2007] Treatment Outcomes with Internet Addicts
    In: CyberPsychology & Behavior 10(5):671-679.
    Research has identified internet addiction as a new and often unrecognized clinical disorder that impact a user’s ability to control online use to the extent that it can cause relational, occupational, and social problems. While much of the literature explores the psychological and social factors underlying internet addiction, little if any empirical evidence exists that examines specific treatment outcomes to deal with this new client population. This is an investigation on the efficacy of using Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) with internet addicts.

  • [2009] Understanding Online Gaming Addiction and Treatment Issues for Adolescents
    In: The American Journal of Family Therapy, 37: 355-72, 2009
    MMORPGs seem to be one of the fastest growing forms of internet addication, especially among children and teenagers. The become preoccupied with gaming, lie about their gaming use, lose interest in other activities just to game, withdrawal from family and freinds to game, and use gaming as a means of psychological escape. Kimberley Young explores the emergens of online gaming addiction and its impact on individuals and families. She also reviews the nature of online games and what makes them addictive among some players.

  • [2014] Reflections from the International Congress on Internet Addiction Disorders – Cultural and Clinical Perspectives.
    On the International Congress on Internet Addiction Disorders almost all questions were put on the table. But there are still some open questions. (1) Which set of standardized criteria should we use to define internet addiction (be it problematic internet use, pathological internet use, technology addiction, or other terms)? (2) How do co-morbid psychiatric syndromes and personality traits play a role in the development of internet addiction disorders? (3) How does age of onset influence childhood development, what do parents and families need to know for prevention and what resources are available to them as well as to schools? How young is to young for children to be introduced to technology? (4) Where are the outcome studies that investigate the best practices in treating Internet addiction disorders among adolescents and adults? (5) What is the the role of culture in the development of internet addiction disorders and how can public health policies through government and healthcare systems enable more effective responses for providing resources, prevention, education, and treatment?

  • [2015] Children and Media Addiction: What Parents Should Know
    Many parents have few rules about use of media by their children and adolescents, and have no idea how much time the youngsters spent with media. Kimberley gives some simple and quickly applied tips for parents.

  • [2015] Addicted to Fantasy Sports Games is Real
    In fantasy sports sites you can now achieve immediate gratification in winning each day, much like an addiction to gambling and betting. Whether it’s playing fantasy sports just to win some money, or for the feeling of authority of pure entertainment, there’s no question fantasy sports sites have become addicting. Fantasy sports is sort of a sub-culture within the culture of gambling, where people have wagered on games using both bookies and offshore websites. Some people who have lost everything because they chase and chase games.

• Wikipedia
  • Cyberpsychology
  • Psychotherapy in Cyberspace
  • Online identity | Digital identity | Identity 2.0 | Identity 3.0
  • Authentication | Electronic authentication

Editor	dr. Albert Benschop Social & Behavioral Studies University of Amsterdam
Created	September, 1996
Last modified	13th November, 2015