First Wave Of Research Research Articles

Classical psychedelics in psychiatry - renaissance of interest and therapeutic perspectives.

Substances that change the states of consciousness have been used in the therapeutics of traditional cultures for hundreds of years. In the Western cultural circle, scientific curiosity and hope for a breakthrough in the treatment of various mental disorders constituted the basis of the first wave of research on humans with the use of psychedelics. After synthesizing LSD, psychedelic substances aroused intense but short-term interest among mental health specialists at the beginning of the second half of the 20th century. In the preliminary studies, substances such as psilocybin or LSD, used as a supplement to psychotherapy, showed promising therapeutic effects, however, due to legal and political reasons, all research work was stopped in the 1970s. The last two decades have been a period of renaissance in the interest in using sychedelic substances in psychiatry. Despite the early stage of work, the clinical research conducted so far has indicated the potential benefits of using psychedelics in the treatment of anxiety, affective disorders, or addictions. Moreover, so far, no serious side effects of this form of therapy have been reported. However, due to a number of barriers of both medical and legal nature, the creation of the first psychiatric drug with psychedelic properties appears to be extremely complicated. Further, precisely constructed studies on large groups of patients are needed to determine whether psychedelics can find practical applications in psychiatric therapy (or even become a long-awaited breakthrough in the treatment of mental disorders).

TRANSFORMATION OF UKRAINIAN YOUTH VALUES IN TIMES OF CRISIS

The value system of a certain society is characterized by stability, transmitted from generation to generation and determines the direction of the socio-economic, political development of the country. In a fragile, non-linear and incomprehensible globalized world, a shift in society’s values can be triggered by global upheavals that threaten the survival of humans as a biological species. In the 21st century, society feels the danger of war, the threat of the spread of dangerous viruses, and the digitalization of all human life. The purpose of the conducted research is to identify the main values of Ukrainian youth and their transformation in the conditions of economic crises and war danger. Sociological research was conducted to verify hypotheses as to accelerating the transformation of Ukrainian youth values. The first wave of research on the value orientations of Kharkiv student youth was conducted in March 2014, similar research was conducted during November 2020 – January 2021, as well as in April-May 2022. The results showed that absolute and family values traditionally have a high level of priority for Ukrainian youth, regardless of living conditions and external factors. However, changes have taken place within value groups. With the aggravation of the military danger, the values of freedom, honesty, and preservation of life came to the fore. During the military threat, the importance of the group of civic and national values increased significantly. Among the national ones, the greatest growth was gained by the state independence of Ukraine, patriotism, readiness to defend the Motherland, love for the native culture, language, and traditions. Digital values have shown sufficient stability of results compared to pre-war times. Digital government services and digital technologies to improve energy efficiency have grown. The results of the study can be useful for building visions and strategies for the development of higher education institutions, modern youth regional policy.

Stabilita a změna osobních hodnot u lidí s různými trajektoriemi životní dráhy: longitudinální studie

Background. Previous research on the stability of personal values in the context of life transitions has usually focused on the presence of a single transition. However, life transitions in everyday life occur simultaneously with other life transitions. The aim of this longitudinal study was therefore to identify different trajectories of life transitions in young adults and to compare the stability of their personal values. Method. In the first wave of research, participants were 18-33 years old; in the second wave, they were 29-43 years old (N = 632; 392 women). In both waves, they completed Schwartzʼs Portrait Value Questionnaires (PVQ); in the second wave, they completed the Life History Calendar focusing on the presence of entry into life transitions. Results. Latent class analysis revealed two trajectories: Experienced transitions (people who experienced all observed transitions) and Partially experienced transitions (people who experienced only entry into regular employment and part of them entered cohabitation). Differential stability of personal values occurred in both trajectories. The differences in the stability of values found between the individual trajectories were insignificant, except for personal values universalism and tradition. Although before entry into life transitions, personal values were not significant predictors of belonging to a particular trajectory, after their experiencing people with the Experienced transitions trajectory more often reached lower levels of values associated with openness to change.

NOT EVERYTHING IS COVID: PERSISTENT FEVER AND MALAISE MIMICKING COVID-19 PNEUMONIA

TOPIC: Chest Infections TYPE: Medical Student/Resident Case Reports INTRODUCTION: The diagnosis of COVID-19 has depended on the use of a Reverse transcriptase polymerase chase reaction test (RT-PCR) on respiratory samples. While this has directed the response and care of patients with suspected COVID-19, there have been false-negative results depending on when the test was administered in relation to time of exposure and symptom onset. CASE PRESENTATION: A 19-year-old male with no significant past medical history presented to the emergency department in July 2020 with a persistent fever of 100 -103F for 10 days. He returned from Texas 9 days prior with onset of fever one day before depature. He had a mild, non-productive cough, body aches, and poor oral intake. He also had diffuse abdominal pain with diarrhea and bilious, non-bloody vomiting - up to three times a day. He had elevated WBC, ESR, CRP and LDH with Lymphopenia. Blood cultures and HIV, Syphilis, EBV and Mycoplasma screening were negative as was a COVID-19 test. CT scan of his chest and abdomen revealed peripheral ground glass opacities suspicious of COVID 19. A repeat COVID test on hospital day 2 was again negative. He was treated with Azithromycin and Doxycycline and discharged home on Azithromycin on hospital day 4. He was readmitted 6 days later because of persistent fever to 103F, joint pains, malaise and weight loss of about 10 pounds. ESR, CRP, Ferritin and LDH were again elevated. A repeat CT scan showed resolution of previously seen ground glass opacities in the anterior lung fields and new confluent areas of ground glass attenuation and interlobular septal thickening posteriorly. A 3rd, 4th and 5th COVID-19 tests performed were negative. He was treated with Acetaminophen alternating with Ketorolac. A TTE showed a hyperlucency concerning for a right atrial thrombus or vegetation. Left ventricular ejection fraction was 50%. An MRI of the heart showed an inflammatory picture consistent with myocarditis. Further testing was done to reveal the etiology of his myocarditis to be Coxsackie A7,9, and 16. Clinically, there was significant improvement with resolution of fever and malaise and return of WBC count to normal. DISCUSSION: This patient's diagnosis of Coxsackie A myocarditis was clouded by the medical team's strong suspicion of COVID-19 pneumonia because of his clinical presentation and history of travel during the month of June to a part of the US with rising rates of COVID-19 cases. The unknown precise false-negative rate of the COVID-19 test, which can be anywhere from 2-27% depending on the time of testing from initial exposure meant that the diagnosis was never deemed impossible even with consecutive negative test results. CONCLUSIONS: While the attention COVID-19 is receiving is well deserved, anecdotal accumulation of evidence along with the scientific community's first wave of research has produced heuristics that need to be overcome to optimize patient care and outcomes. REFERENCE #1: Kucirka LM, Lauer SA, Laeyendecker O, Boon D, Lessler J. Variation in False-Negative Rate of Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction–Based SARS-CoV-2 Tests by Time Since Exposure. Ann Intern Med [Internet]. 2020 May 13 REFERENCE #2: Arevalo-Rodriguez I, Arevalo-Rodriguez I, Buitrago-Garcia D, Simancas-Racines D, et al. False-negative results of initial RT-PCR assays for COVID-19: a systematic review. April 21, 2020 (preprint). REFERENCE #3: Steven Woloshin, M.D., Neeraj Patel, B.A., and Aaron S. Kesselheim, M.D., J.D., M.P.H. False Negative Tests for SARS-CoV-2 Infection — Challenges and Implications. DOI:10.1056/NEJMp2015897, June 5, 2020 DISCLOSURES: No relevant relationships by Christiana Atuaka, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Carmina Aybar Rodriguez, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Claudia De Araujo Duarte, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Khurriyat Foziljonova, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Varun tej Gonuguntla, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Margaret Ku n-Basti, source=Web Response

Political socialization in meme times: Adolescents and the sources of knowledge concerning politics

As observed by Richard G. Niemi and Mary A. Hepburn, the first wave of research on political socialization began in the 1950s and ended in the 1970s. During this period, a preliminary definition of...

Philosophical and psychological approaches to bullshit

In this paper, we give an overview of philosophical considerations of and psychological empirical research on bullshit. While taking this concept from philosophy, in the first wave of research, psychologists implicitly changed both the content and definition of the concept, focusing on aspects of bullshit phenomena addressable by empirical tools, such as individual differences in bullshit receptivity. In the second wave, researchers, adequately, relied more on contemporary philosophical analyses and definitions of bullshit. This led to employing experimental procedures to examine the distinctive features of such statements, influence of the speaker, that is - the source of bullshit, as well as implications for public discourse. In the concluding part, shortcomings of the existing approaches addressed, social implications of use of bullshit and receptivity to them are highlighted, and suggestions on how to overcome these shortcomings are presented.

Resilience in the Perspective of Adolescents

Resilience refers the process of overcoming the negative effects of risk exposure, coping successfully with traumatic experiences, and avoiding the negative trajectories associated with risks. The process of resilience may also vary for different groups of adolescents. Resilience for urban and suburban youth, for example, may differ from resilience for rural youth. Similarly, resilience may differ for high- and low-socioeconomic-status youth, for males and females.According Alvord and Grados (2005), numerous definitions of resilience require conditions of an identified risk or challenge followed by some defined measure of positive outcome. However, debate remains concerning what constitutes resilient behavior and how best measure successful adaptation hardship. Resilience is not an one-dimensional, dichotomous attribute that an individual has or does not have. It has been suggested that a resilient individual must show positive outcomes across multiple aspects of life over a period of time (Cicchetti & Rogosch, 1997). Moreover, resilience indicates the possession of several skills, in varying degrees, that help a person cope (Alvord & Grados, 2005).Resilience refers a class of phenomena characterized by good outcomes in spite of serious threats adaptation or development. Resilience has been characterized as the ability to:* bounce back and cope effectively in the face of difficulties* bend, but not break under extreme stress* rebound from adversities* handle setbacks, persevere and adapt even when things go awry* maintain equilibrium following highly aversive eventsHistorically, the origins of resilience have deep roots in the field of medicine; however, research on resilience in the behavioral sciences began emerge around 1970 (Cicchetti, 2006; Cicchetti & Curtis, 2006; Masten, 2007, 2011; Masten & Obradovic, 2006). According Masten (2011), pioneering scientists contended that critical aspects of human function and development, crucial for understanding and promoting prevention of, resistance to, or recovery from psychopathology, had been profoundly neglected. Four decades of resilience research followed as scientists took the challenge of this phenomenon (Masten, 2007). There have been three waves of research on resilience in development. The first wave of research came from scientists wanting understand and prevent the development of psychopathology (Masten, 2011; Masten & Obradovic, 2006). These pioneer researchers acknowledged the importance of children who seemed progress well under risky conditions (Masten & Obradovic, 2006). The second wave of resilience research concentrated on detecting the processes and regulatory systems that accounted for protective factors associated with resilience (Masten & Obradovic, 2006). The third wave arose due a sense of urgency for the welfare of children growing up with adversities focusing on promoting resilience through prevention, intervention, and policy.Over a relatively short time span, research in resilience has expanded significantly and has led fascinating analyses and conclusions. Bonnie Benard, an important contributor recent summaries of this body of knowledge, suggests that there are four key messages that have come out of resilience research:* Resilience is a capacity all youth have for healthy development and successful learning.* Certain personal strengths are associated with healthy development and successful learning.* Certain characteristics of families, schools and communities are associated with the development of personal strengths and, in turn, healthy development and successful learning.* Changing the life trajectories of children and youth from risk resilience starts with changing the beliefs of the adults in their families, schools and communities.Adolescence (from Latin adolescence, meaning to grow up) is a transitional stage of physical and psychological human development that generally occurs during the period from puberty legal adulthood (age of majority). …

The impact of agricultural investments on state capacity: A comparative analysis of Ethiopia and Ghana

The first wave of research on the ‘global land grab’ largely focused on the international drivers of investment and impacts of individual projects in host countries. More recent studies have acknowledged the important roles played by both host states and societal organisations in these deals. However, there has been little attempt to analyse how processes of agricultural investments also transform the state itself. The present paper builds on theories regarding the social roots of state power and the literature on the links between land and authority, to construct a framework that can be used to explore these linkages. The central argument of the paper is that in situations of overlapping authority between state and societal organisations—which is common in Africa—increased agricultural investment requires infrastructure development and can provoke changes in power relations between state and society that have important implications for state capacity. We illustrate this by examining the recent investment trends in two countries that have figured prominently in the ‘land grab’ literature but where land tenure regimes and state–society relations take markedly different forms—Ethiopia, where a ‘strong’ state has actively promoted agricultural investments as part of a developmental and state-building project that has enhanced its territorial control; and Ghana where chiefs have taken advantage of increased demand from investors in an attempt to (re-)assert their authority over land vis-à-vis the state and other societal organisations.

The Druze Community and the Lebanese State, between Confrontation and Reconciliation

The Druze Community and the Lebanese State, between Confrontation and Reconciliation

S.NET and NanoEthics: A Pair of Siblings

This editorial has been written on the way back from the 7th annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Nanoscience and Emerging Technologies (S.NET), which was once again a truly inspiring and instructive event. The conference was held in Montreal in October under the title BFrom Nanotechnologies to Emerging Technologies: Towards a Global Responsibility^ and was mainly organised by the knowledge network Ne3LS, a very noteworthy long-term initiative set up by the Government of Quebec to examine the ethical, environmental, economic, legal and social issues raised by the development of nanotechnology. S.NET and this journal can be described as a pair of siblings.NanoEthics is a little older, its first issue having been published back in 2007, while the first S.NET meeting annual meeting took place in 2009. Both are children of the first wave of research and discussions on nanotechnology, but also established themselves early on as important forums for reflection on new and emerging science and technology more generally, including other fields of technology and a wide variety of aspects of current technoscience. Recently, NanoEthics has changed its subtitle to Studies of New and Emerging Technologies, and S.NET is about to change its full name to the Society for Studies of New and Emerging Technologies. Both siblings are open to impulses that come from beyond academia, such as contributions by civil society activists, industry representatives, policy makers, early technology adopters and artists. There are large overlaps, not only thematically but also in terms of the people involved.While the journal’s readers and contributors come from a wide variety of academic communities and NanoEthics is certainly not S.NET’s house journal, there is clearly a special relationship between the two at many levels. The present issue is a particular testament to this, since the authors of its first two articles gave talks in Montreal, and an entire special section is based on a session at last year’s S.NET annual meeting. In the first article, Vanessa Chenel, Patrick Boissy, Jean-Pierre Cloarec and Johane Patenaude analyse acceptability judgments concerning the use of nanocarrierbased targeted drug delivery. After sending out a questionnaire to a large number of Francophone scientists and scholars in Canada and Europe, they conducted interviews with a subset of the respondents, half of whom were French and half Canadian, while half were natural scientists or engineers and half social scientists or humanities scholars. The authors highlight contextual factors that bring about variability in acceptability judgments, arguing that effective consideration of these contextual factors could add a supplementary layer of information to assessment procedures and improve stakeholder discourse on technological innovation. In the second article, Daniele Ruggiu contrasts two versions of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI), the important new European approach to science, Nanoethics (2015) 9:197–198 DOI 10.1007/s11569-015-0246-x

Reclaiming, proclaiming, and maintaining collective identity in the #YoSoy132 movement in Mexico: an examination of digital frontstage and backstage activism through social media and instant messaging platforms

This article starts from the recognition that digital social movements studies have progressively disregarded collective identity and the importance of internal communicative dynamics in contemporary social movements, in favour of the study of the technological affordances and the organizational capabilities of social media. Based on a two-year multimodal ethnography of the Mexican #YoSoy132 movement, the article demonstrates that the concept of collective identity is still able to yield relevant insights into the study of current movements, especially in connection with the use of social media platforms. Through the appropriations of social media, Mexican students were able to oppose the negative identification fabricated by the PRI party, reclaim their agency and their role as heirs of a long tradition of rebellion, generate collective identification processes, and find ‘comfort zones’ to lower the costs of activism, reinforcing their internal cohesion and solidarity. The article stresses the importance of the internal communicative dynamics that develop in the backstage of social media (Facebook chats and groups) and through instant messaging services (WhatsApp), thus rediscovering the pivotal linkage between collective identity and internal communication that characterized the first wave of research on digital social movements. The findings point out how that internal cohesion and collective identity are fundamentally shaped and reinforced in the social media backstage by practices of ‘ludic activism’, which indicates that social media represent not only the organizational backbone of contemporary social movements, but also multifaceted ecologies where a new, expressive and humorous ‘communicative resistance grammar’ emerges.

Cultural Similarity and Mediation Offers in Interstate Conflicts, 1945–1995

This article seeks to explain the role and salience of culture in interstate conflict management efforts. Past studies of cultural similarity in conflict management involving third parties often focused on two-way cultural relationships: either examining cultural similarity between disputants or similarity between third parties and each of the disputants as individuals. However, we argue that this first wave of research should be augmented by a focus on triads. Our study asks the question: to what extent does cultural similarity among disputants and potential mediators predict the likelihood of a mediation offer? We test our hypotheses using data from the International Conflict Management Dataset between 1945 and 1995 and find that mediation offers are most likely to emerge when the triad is ethnically or religiously similar, while shared political culture is not a reliable predictor of mediation offers to disputing dyads.

Absorptive Capacity and Contextual Factors that Influence Green IT Assimilation

The first wave of research in Green IT has often focused on organisational adoption. As Green IT matures in organisations it is important to look beyond adoption and to investigate the assimilation of Green IT. To this end we draw from and compare two theories – contextual theory and absorptive capacity – and investigate which of the two theories better explains the level of Green IT assimilation in organisations. Results from an international survey of 148 large organisations show that both theories explain Green IT assimilation with a medium effect size and that while contextual theory has a slightly higher R2 value than absorptive capacity, the difference is not statistically significant. We then propose a parsimonious and integrated model of Green IT assimilation drawing on contextual and absorptive capacity theories and outline implications for practitioners. The integrated model is parsimonious and has a higher explanatory power implying that a combination of contextual and absorptive capacity factors influences why and how widely and deeply Green IT practices, technologies and values are embedded in the IT people, in the IT management and IT infrastructure of organisations.

New Media, Professional Sport and Political Economy

New media technologies are seen to be changing the production, delivery and consumption of professional sports and creating a new dynamic between sports fans, athletes, clubs, governing bodies and the mainstream media. However, as Bellamy and McChesney (2011) have pointed out, advances in digital technologies are taking place within social, political, and economic contexts that are strongly conditioning the course and shape of this communication revolution. This essay assesses the first wave of research on professional sport and new media technologies and concludes that early trends indicate the continuation of existing neoliberal capitalist tendencies within professional sport. Using the concept of political economy, the essay explores issues of ownership, structure, production and delivery of sport. Discussion focuses on the opportunities sports fans now have available to them and how sports organization and media corporations shifted from an initial position of uncertainty, that bordered on hostility, to one which has seen them embrace new media technologies as powerful marketing tools. The essay concludes by stating as fundamental the issues of ownership and control and advocates that greater cognizance be accorded to underlying economic structures and the enduring, all-pervasive power of neoliberal capitalism and its impact in professional sport.

Lesbian Mothers and Their Children: The Third Wave

Research regarding lesbian mothers and their children has gone through a transformation in the last forty years. The first wave of research examined lesbians who had become parents while in heterosexual relationships. The second wave examined women who became parents within the context of lesbian relationships. Both of these waves focused on family functioning and child outcome, using heterosexual-headed families as comparison groups. The third wave of research, which is now underway, is focusing on the unique challenges faced by these families, and how lesbian mothers are creating and raising their families on their own terms. This article explores the research as it has evolved over the years and the direction in which it is headed.

When Truth Commissions Improve Human Rights

Most studies of truth commissions assert their positive role in improving human rights. A first wave of research made these claims based on qualitative analysis of a single truth commission or a small number of cases. Thirty years of experience with truth commissions and dozens of examples allow cross-national statistical studies to assess these findings. Two recent studies undertake that project. Their findings, which are summarized in this article, challenge the prevailing view that truth commissions foster human rights, showing instead that commissions, when used alone, tend to have a negative impact on human rights. Truth commissions have a positive impact, however, when used in combination with trials and amnesties. This article extends the question of whether truth commissions improve human rights to how, when and why they succeed or fail in doing so. It presents a ‘justice balance’ explanation, whereby commissions, incapable of promoting stability and accountability on their own, contribute to human rights improvements when they complement and enhance amnesties and prosecutions. The article draws on experiences in Brazil, Chile, Nepal, South Korea and South Africa to illustrate the central argument.

The endosteal ‘osteoblastic’ niche and its role in hematopoietic stem cell homing and mobilization

The concept of hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) niche was formulated in 1978, but HSC niches remained unidentified for the following two decades largely owing to technical limitations. Sophisticated live microscopy techniques and genetic manipulations have identified the endosteal region of the bone marrow (BM) as a preferential site of residence for the most potent HSC - able to reconstitute in serial transplants - with osteoblasts and their progenitors as critical cellular elements of these endosteal niches. This article reviews the path to the discovery of these endosteal niches (often called 'osteoblastic' niches) for HSC, what cell types contribute to these niches with their known physical and biochemical features. In the past decade, a first wave of research uncovered many mechanisms responsible for HSC homing to, and mobilization from, the whole BM tissue. However, the recent discovery of endosteal HSC niches has initiated a second wave of research focusing on the mechanisms by which most primitive HSC lodge into and migrate out of their endosteal niches. The second part of this article reviews the current knowledge of the mechanisms of HSC lodgment into, retention in and mobilization from osteoblastic niches.

Perceiving Others’ Perceptions of Risk

The recent literature providing insights from neuroscience and evolutionary biology into how individuals perceive risky choice situations represents a "second wave" of findings that recapitulates as well as challenges the risk perception research begun in the 1980s, which relied on psychometric survey research. Gleaning insights from the first wave of research that could improve the communication and control of environmental risks has yielded disappointing results. This is a result, in part, of the eagerness of scholars and pundits to posit a chasm between the "rational" and "objective" perceptions of experts, on the one hand, and a lay public that is seen as lurching between "paranoia and neglect" and as insensitive to the magnitude of risks. Interpretations of the psychometric research have suffered from inattention to uncertainty and interindividual variability in risk, to expert biases, and to important aspects of risky choice that were not explored in the first wave of research. Initial signs indicate that neuroscience and evolutionary biology research may fall prey to similar misinterpretations. This article summarizes some of the most intriguing findings of the "second wave" of risk perception research and advances four themes that may help make the new findings less divisive and more useful for improving risk communication and risk management. Continued research into risk perception should perhaps be embedded in a more general theory of public choice in the face of uncertain and variable costs and benefits and with a respect for distributive justice as an important goal in risk management.

A New Wave in the History of Corporate Governance

This special issue showcases a new wave of historical research on corporate governance. The new wave is reacting to the exhaustion of the intellectual agenda of the initial scholarship devoted to the question of the emergence and variable development of corporate governance systems in different national economies. Indeed, in many ways the new wave represents a moment of genuine intellectual liberation. Much of the old literature focused nearly exclusively on questions regarding the concentration or dispersion of ownership, and attendant issues of the strength of minority protections, the role of banks, and the depth of the securities market in different countries. New wave scholars are asking historical questions about types of corporate governance and the evolution of national systems that literally could not be seen within the categories of the old debate—or if they could be seen, were thought to be so tangential to the dynamics of efficient governance that they were ignored. How is it possible, for example, for there to have been a deep securities market and strong universal banks in pre World War I Germany? Or, what role in national economic development did pyramid holding structures playin turn of the century Japan? Did the existence of a legal alternative to the joint stock company, such as the private limited liability company (PLLC) affect the manner in which different countries embraced the joint stock corporation? New questions have also stimulated search for new kinds of data, and most of the new wave historians of corporate governance have been immersed in archival research that was simply not characteristic of the work that their predecessors undertook. This close archival work has in turn generated new observations and new questions. How did the various stock exchanges in the USA between 1880 and 1930 actually work? Who bought what, where, how, and to what effect? Or, how did the cosmopolitan character of London impact the relationship between finance and the large and numerous British global corporations? How was family ownership concretely related to the dispersal of stock? All of the above questions are posed and, to a degree, answered by the essays in this issue. The purpose of this brief introduction will be to outline why those are interesting and quite new questions in the context of the historiography of corporate governance. The first section will outline how the first wave of research into the comparative history of corporate governance exhausted itself and, thereby, created the possibility for new wave scholars to pose alternative sorts of questions. The second section sets out the thematic and methodological distinctiveness of the new wave of research. The third section outlines the specific contributions to the special issue.

The Question of Christian Community Online: The Case of the 'Artist World Network'

The Question of Christian Community Online: The Case of the 'Artist World Network' Heidi Campbell Patricia Calderon Introduction The past decade has seen a steady growth of technologies and practices that can be described as religion online. In many respects Christian groups and users have led the way in using the web for spiritual practices. From church websites becoming a common form of congregational advertising and communication to the rise of cyber churches and online prayer meetings, numerous forms of Christian practice have been transposed online. The Christian community has also been at the forefront of debates over the potential impact of 'doing religion' online. Concerns voiced by theologians, pastors and Christian scholars have included the potential that technology might become a substitute for God, the Internet could draw people away for organised religion towards individualised spiritualities, and that the Internet might re-shape notions of traditional ritual and community. In light of these questions a new area of research has developed which involves exploring how Christian religious practice is being transformed in the age of Internet technology. The development of the study of Christianity online can be conceptualised in sequential terms by what Hojsgaard and Warburg identify as three waves. The first wave of research on religion online focused on the new and extraordinary aspects of cyberspace, where religion 'could (and probably would) do almost anything'.1 In the mid-1990s the Internet was seen as a tool for religious and social transformation. Initial interest in many studies was on how this new technology created possibilities for new versions of Christianity or at least provided parishioners the possibility to reinvent traditional religious practices online. First wave studies were often overly utopian or dystopian in their views; the Internet was seenas either building or even transforming Christian solidarity or potentially [End Page 261] destroying traditional forms of Christian community and morality. The second wave built upon early descriptive studies but moved towards a 'more realistic perspective' by seeking concrete ways to define and compare different forms of online religious phenomena. Researchers began to understand that it was not simply the technology, but people who were generating these new forms of religious expression online and moved towards studying more the motivations on Christian online users and how online Christian religious practices mirrored or influenced offline religious ones. As research has further matured, Hojsgaard and Warburg surmised that a third wave of research 'may be just around the corner'.2 They describe this research as a 'bricolage of scholarship coming from different backgrounds with diverse methodological preference'.3 Current third wave research is being marked by more collaborative, longitudinal and interdisciplinary explorations, looking at what religion online has to tell us about the religion in general in an information age.4 Within such studies, the question of Christian or religious community online continues to surface as a central area of concern. As more andmore Christian Internet users become involved in various chat, emailand blogging groups, they are increasingly seeing and referring to these online social networks as religious communities. For many believers their Christian community involves both online and offline friendships and affiliations, a concept still problematic and contentious to many religious leaders. Thus, the purpose of this article is to investigate what constitutes a Christian community online and the possibilities and challenges that exist when Christians who gather for religious purpose online begin to conceive of their group as a Christian community. This is done by exploring a particular Christian online bulletin board, the 'Artist World Network', in order to understand how this group sees itself and functions as community. This investigation provides a way to address the question of what constitutes an online Christian community. It also opens up discussion on the possibilities and challenges online religious communities pose for offline Christian community. Defining and Studying Online Community Since the 1980s, many examples of religious groups using computers to facilitate new...