Online Friendship, Chat-Room Romance and Cybersex: Your Guide to Affairs of the Net [Import] [Paperback]

Michael; Motta, Sheree Adamse (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 250 pages
• Publisher: Health Communications, Incorporated (1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558744185
• ISBN-13: 978-1558744189
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,079,274 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great strategy for meeting others through Chat Rooms!, May 5, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Online Friendship, Chat-Room Romance and Cybersex: Your Guide to Affairs of the Net (Paperback)

I enjoyed this book because it provided a plan that I could put in place without hiring an expect. The authors did a great job of making it easy for the average reader. Online relationship building 101. Great Job!

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Excellent for the non-initiated or novice online user., February 6, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (USA, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Online Friendship, Chat-Room Romance and Cybersex: Your Guide to Affairs of the Net (Paperback)

For those that have never been online, or, those that are relatively new to the online experience; this book provides a great overview. The authors have done an excellent job at reducing complex psychological phenomena to an easily understandable level. Also, they have highlighted most of the major elements that comprise the online experience.

I do not feel that this book would be of tremendous value to the experienced online user for it fails to address some of the "real" issues that confront us all, i.e., confusion, guilt, anxiety, etc. Though the authors give valuable information in regards to such phenomena as projective identification, sensory deprivation, lowering of habitual self-conscious defense mechanisms, etc.; it fails to compare and contrast these phenomena between our realities in such a way as to provide a foundation for making wise cyber choices.

It is very difficult to write any book; and certainly this subject matter is resistant to typical definitions in the absence of all the affect of real life inducements that typify reactive behaviors. The authors 'flirt' around with psychodynamic concepts, but fail to broach the subject deeply; probably by choice. However, for the experienced user, certain psychological factors that have been only briefly touched upon, could be misinterpreted.

The authors did not differentiate between that which constitutes 'personality' and that which would constitute 'character', and lay their emphasis on the observation of one's personality as a yardstick of cyber discernment. It would be unwise to confer upon another a 'label' based upon certain behaviors. Personality is more erratic than character, and there are many reasons why one's personality may be provoked to react in a particular way that the casual observer may be totally unaware of. The author's mislead the reader in saying that this environment is like psychoanalytic 'free association', implying that the manifestations of personality are then a 'true' and accurate picture of another. Unlike online, the 'free association' of psychoanalytic therapy is to make interpretations weighed against a body of evidence over a prevailing length of time. Also, in an analytic setting, the analyst observes passively aware, whereas online we are still 'reacting' to the inducements provided by other people and circumstances. It manifestly is not free association. To ascribe to a particular behavior that such and such a person is 'narcissistic' or 'sociopathic' is not an interpretation: it is a judgment.

Those that have online experience probably have learned that the utterances of the personality often have little, if no meaning at all. Without providing in-depth 'tools' of differentiation for the reader to utilize when gauging another, those that are looking for gleaning greater understanding on how to make wiser cyber choices will be disappointed.

Again, each book is authored to address a certain target group, and I repeat, that for the novice or the uninitiated, this is an excellent place to start. For the more experienced, I would recommend "Cyber Bed's Don't Squeak", which delves into the psychodynamic peculiarities and offers suggestions on how to recognize and reconcile these conflicting and confusing phenomena.