Dr. Okdie Edits Special Issue of the Journal of Social Psychology
Dr. Okdie is co-editing a special issue of the Journal of Social Psychology entitled Interpersonal Relationships in the Digital Age.
Humans have a fundamental need to create and maintain interpersonal relationships (Baumiester & Leary, 1995). While the psychological study of interpersonal relationships has been fruitful, much of the extant research has examined these relationships in face-to-face settings. Recent advancements in technology have led to an increase in the use of media to create, maintain, and develop interpersonal relationships through various media. There are now a myriad of ways that individuals can interact socially with others online. The rise in online interpersonal relationships has led psychologists to call for an increase psychological study of media (Okdie et al., 2014) to investigate questions such as: What are the unique affordances of different media technologies (such as editability) that impact relationship development? How are interpersonal relationships started or maintained in a mediated environment? Are the trajectories of these relationships different from similar off-line relationships? In what way are these differences psychologically meaningful?
The current special issue will serve as a base of knowledge from which researchers from various domains can use to understand online interpersonal relationships. We broadly define online interpersonal relationships as any relationships between individuals that occur through a mediated channel. Thus, our special issue would likely contain, but would not be limited to, interpersonal relationships that occur though channels such as social media web sites, video games, e-mail, text-messaging, and online dating. Additional topics could include parasocial relationships with media characters.
Possible Topics:
- Online dating
- Social Media
- Texting
- Parasocial relationships
- Video game interactions
We expect the special issue in The Journal of Social Psychology to be published in the summer of 2018. One page summaries describing the intended manuscript, including the current status of the data collection process, should be sent directly to Brad Okdie at <Okdie.2@osu.edu> by July 1st, 2016. Because JSP accepts pre-registered manuscripts, it is acceptable to submit an abstract for a study where the data are not yet collected. Submissions that are viewed by the Guest Editors as potentially impactful will be encouraged to submit a full manuscript.
Invited full manuscripts are due January 8th 2017. These manuscripts should be submitted through the usual JSP author submission process, see author’s instructions online at < http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/vsoc20/current>. These manuscripts will follow the typical peer review process with the guest editor determining the final accepted manuscripts. The journal values scientific transparency and awards Open Science badges for those who publicly share their data, materials, and pre-registered hypotheses. Where possible, we hope that these manuscripts will meet these standards.
For further questions about the special issue or submission questions please contact us (Okdie.2@osu.edu or ewoldsen.msu@gmail.com). You may view the full call online here: osf.io/qk6nm
