Documents menu
Date: Sun, 18 Oct 98 01:11:59 CDT
From: Mark Graffis <ab758@virgin.usvi.net>
Subject: Marginal groups (i.e. the rest of us) thrive on the Internet
Organization: ?
Article: 45592
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Message-ID: <bulk.23578.19981020121533@chumbly.math.missouri.edu>
http://www.sciencenews.org
Marginal groups (i.e. the rest of us) thrive on the Internet
By B. Bower, in Science News, Vol. 154, no. 16 17 October 1998, p. 245
More than 30,000 different Internet newsgroups now exist, allowing
members to send and receive messages on interests that range from
the mundane to the weird. Membership in online groups may prove
particularly helpful, at least in promoting self-acceptance and
social support, for individuals whose unconventional traits or
behaviors make it difficult to find compatriots in daily life, a
new study finds.
Internet newsgroup users of this ilk include people with epilepsy,
incest survivors, and sexual sadists. If the findings hold up, they
will indicate that people viewed as cultural outsiders can form
stable, emotionally supportive online groups.
"Whatever position one takes regarding the values of the various
[online groups], the psychological effects of virtual group
participation are nonetheless real," contend Katelyn Y.A. McKenna
and John A. Bargh, both psychologists at New York University. "In
all likelihood, they will be an increasingly common feature of life
in the age of the Internet."
McKenna and Bargh monitored participation in 12 Internet newsgroups
during a 3-week period. They selected four groups that focus on
mainstream interests (such as politics), four that concern
culturally undesirable but conspicuous conditions (such as
obesity), and four that focus on culturally "marginalized" but
concealable behavior (homosexuality, illicit drug use, sexual
bondage, and sexual spanking).
Four judges rated original messages and the responses as positive
or negative. The judges agreed on most of their ratings.
Online gatherings mattered most to participants in "marginalized
but concealable" groups, the scientists contend in the September
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Members of those
groups posted messages far more frequently, often after receiving
positive feedback online, than members of the other groups did.
The scientists then sent electronic questionnaires to individuals
recruited from marginalized-concealable Internet groups. A total of
103 participants in the homosexual, sexual-bondage, and
sexual-spanking groups responded-a majority of those contacted. In
addition, 49 "lurkers," people who read messages on these sites but
did not post, completed the electronic questionnaires.
Another 59 posters to newsgroups concerned with marginal political
and ideological beliefs returned questionnaires, often only after
the researchers convinced them that the project was not part of a
government plot. These groups cater to people concerned with
government cover-ups, extraterrestrial visitors, white supremacy,
and citizen militias. Eighteen lurkers on these sites also
responded.
Compared with lurkers, active participants in all these groups
considered newsgroup membership far more important in their lives,
valued other members' opinions more, and spent more time in the
newsgroup. Many participants said that as a result of newsgroup
membership, they had revealed to friends or family what had been
embarrassing secrets about themselves.
"This is the sort of work that needs to be done, examining
different types of Internet users and different effects of computer
use," remarks psychologist Robert Kraut of Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh. Kraut, who also studies cyberspace
travelers (SN: 9/12/98, p. 168), suspects that all sorts of people
who have difficulty finding others to identify with-from
night-shift workers to the physically disabled-will benefit from
virtual groups.
From Science News, Vol. 154, No. 16, October 17, 1998, p. 245.
Copyright 1998 by Science Service.
References:
McKenna, K.Y.A., and J.A. Bargh. 1998. Coming out in the age of the
internet: Identity "demarginalization" through virtual group
participation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
75(September):681.
Further Readings:
Bower, B. 1998. Social disconnections on-line. Science News
154(Sept. 12):168.
Kraut, R., et al. 1998. Internet paradox. American
Psychologist(September):001.
Sources:
John A. Bargh
New York University
Department of Psychology
6 Washington Place, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10003
Katelyn Y.A. McKenna
New York University
Department of Psychology
6 Washington Place, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10003
|