Media School

Dhaka    Friday, 19 April 2024

By Sajeeb Sarker

Cyberpsychology

Media School July 2, 2020

Cyberpsychology studies the impact of growing use of social media. Image: wikipedia

Cyberpsychology is the study of the human mind and behavior and how the culture of technology, specifically, virtual reality, and social media affect them (Blascovich & Bailenson). The word cyberpsychology is created using 'cyber' taken from the word 'cyberspace' and 'psychology'.

Cyberpsychology is also referred as Internet Psychology, Web Psychology, or Digital Psychology. It is comparatively a new and thus developing field that encompasses all psychological phenomena associated with or affected by emerging new technologies.

Cyberpsychology generally studies the effect of the Internet and cyberspace on the psychology of individuals and groups. Areas of its focus include online identity, online personality, online relationships, and online behavior of a person or group; personality types in cyberspace; addiction to computers and Internet; online gender-switching, etc. American Psychological Association acknowledged Media Psychology as an emerging specialty and the Society for Media Psychology and Technology of the American Psychological Association are now including a good number of cyber-psychologists among its members.

References:
Blascovich, Jim; Bailenson, Jeremy. Infinite reality: avatars, eternal life, new worlds, and the dawn of the virtual revolution (1st ed.). New York: William Morrow. ISBN 978-0061809507.
American Psychological Association
Wikipedia