The CyberPsychology of Flickr

I joined flickr several years ago because I’ve always enjoyed photography and thought being here might be fun as well as educational. Fortunately, I was right about that. I’ve learned a lot here and have really enjoyed meeting people and making friends.

As a psychologist who specializes in studying how people interact with each other in cyberspace (aka “cyberpsychology”), I’ve also found the flickr community itself fascinating. So recently I asked myself, why not do some cyberpsychology research in flickr? During the winter break between semesters I wrote and submitted a grant proposal for such a project. Lo and behold, it was accepted!

Imagistic communication in cyberspace. That’s the fancy title for the project. Basically, it’s about how people in flickr use photographs and images to express themselves, converse with each other, and form relationships as well as groups.

I hate using terms like “analyze” when I do online research. It’s a bit of a cold, even aggressive term, and it’s not how I think about this kind of work. Instead, when I do research in online groups and communities, I offer people observations and reflections on what I see happening, sort of like holding up a mirror. I encourage people to discuss and debate those reflections, and to offer observations of their own. Those discussions lead to more powerful insights than I alone could come up with.

Over the next few months, I’ll be posting images to my stream to encourage those kinds of discussions. In fact, I’ve been doing that sort of thing all along with various ideas related to psychology and photography, haven’t I?

So I welcome my flickr friends and all visitors to participate in those discussions in my photostream. At some point I may also invite people to participate in a private email interviews with me, and in a focus group. If you think you might be interested in that, please let me know!

25 photos | 1,647 views

items are from between 15 Jun 2005 & 26 Jan 2009.