The Psychology of the Internet

by Patricia Wallace

Book Overview

An engaging and research-based text, The Psychology of the Internet provides a balanced overview of the psychological aspects of cyberspace. It explores crucial questions about the Internet's effects... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521797098
• ISBN13: 9780521797092
• Release Date: March 2001
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 294 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Still a Masterpiece

Can you write a book on social and psychological aspects of the internet which is not outdated 10 years after publication? Patricia Wallace manages the impossible. Written before the turn of the century, the book carefully describes and draws conclusions on internet behaviour and interaction. The observation that the advances and changes of the last decade have little impact on the findings are supportive of their validity and strength. It's also entertaining to read and accessible for the non-psychologist. Recommended.

A well researched and highly illuminative book

This book came at a time when most books written about internet by social scientists, journalists etc., were either too focused on very incidental benefits of internet like the virtual communities, or starkly apolocalyptic in their analyses or chracterized by a Pollyanna utopianism. More speculative thinking that research and analysis chracterizes many books on the internet. This one, based on a thorough grounding in social psychology and a comprehensive review of empirical literature on the subject, studies how behavior and thinking has got effected by the internet, how we behave offline and online, how going online effects us etc. However, this is a book on the social psychology of the internet and not psychology proper. It's more about how we behave online etc., than about how internet alters cognition. Nevertheless, at the end of reading it, the reader feels a sense of having returned with a much deeper understanding than he or she could have achieved on his/her own.

solid information in a well written form

Wallace knows what she's talking about, and she puts it in very readable prose. I particularly like what she says about disinhibition on the 'Net.

Informative, insightful, rewarding reading.

This exploration of the psychological aspects of cyberspace uses the latest research in the social sciences, communications and business fields to consider how the online environment influences behavior. From complementary relationships to polarization and problems in verifying information, The Psychology of the Internet addresses a range of issues and problems.

Informative book on a brand new subject!

Supported by knowledge of recent research, the author provides insight into how people sometimes behave differently on the Internet than they do in real life. According to Wallace, behaviors based on psychology in real life often do not carry over into the virtual world in the same way. For frequent users of the Internet, this information is not startling but eye-opening. For those who use the Internet little or not at all, this is a well-presented introduction to the cyberworld. Although academic in tone, the book is easy to read as it explores the many facets of life on the "Net". Because it is based on clinical research, it gets a bit wearying near the end. However, be sure to read it in its entirety because it is well presented, very inclusive, and quite interesting. Since completing this book, I am more fully cognizant of the different behaviors of "Web" users each time I log on. This would include those inhabitants of cyberspace as well as those who dwell within my own home! :-)