According to the Random House Collegiate Dictionary (1984), cybernetics, from the Greek word kybernet (meaning helmsman, steersman), is defined as: 

the study of human control functions and of mechanical and electrical systems designed to replace them. involving the application of statistical mechanics to communication engineering. 
 

And, psychology is defined as: 

1. the science of the mind or of mental states and processes; the science of human nature. 2. the science of human and animal behavior. 3. the sum of the mental states and processes of a person or of a number of persons, esp. as determining action....

From these two definitions, I composed the following synthesized definition: 

CyberPsychology is the study of the individual's psyche: 

1. while engaged in communication through a mechanical, electrical or (more likely) computerized medium,  

2. when incorporating the use of the computer medium into other aspects of his/her life,  

3. in regards to how the individual learns to use the computer and grows with experience,  

4. in how s/he develops socialization and identity through use of computerized communication,  

5. and, in regards to how changes in society, because of computerized communication, affect him/her. 

CyberPsychology does not need to apply to only those who are actively involved in cyberspace.  Since the internet has become more popular, as more people learn its benefits and how to use it, on-line activities and references to them are becoming much more widespread.  Advertisements in magazines, newspapers and television often refer to their URL address.  For example, IBM has placed a number of advertisements on television in the past few years promoting the benefits of being on-line, how widespread it is and, of course, how they can help get one started and involved as well.  Because of how the internet is pervading our lives, CyberPsychology has applications outside of pure cyberspace realms. 

To understand CyberPsychology, it is a good idea to understand cyberspace as well. The term cyberspace was coined by William Gibson who states that cyberspace is:

A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being
taught mathematical concepts...A graphical representation of data abstracted from the banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the non-space of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city lights, receding...

This site  "Psybernet" quotes more definitions of cyberspace and links to further research such as this . 

The fundamental assumption from which others are derived in CyberPsychology is that it has to involve the individual's psyche:  the mental states -- mind, spirit, soul -- of an individual and how it relates to this new experience of electronic/mechanical communication.  As we understand today, the psyche is made up of affective (emotion, desire, will, intention), cognitive  (thought, creativity, imagination) and sensorimotor  (perceptions/impressions of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch) functions.  These aspects of the psyche create basic areas to study and apply insight pertaining to how they are affected by and how they contribute to the affects of the new technology and its applications.   

There is a myriad of topics and directions in which cyber psychology can and most likely will undertake.  Already of concern are topics such as: 

• Identity and gender switching; 
• Social and romantic relationships;  
• Buying and selling behaviors on-line;
• The affects of increased simulation of life;
• The affects on child and adult development;
• How the internet affects face to face contact;
• How increased communication abilities affects the individual;  
• An individual's place in on-line communities;   
• Gambling on-line and other addictive behaviors; 
• Promotion and censorship of pornography, hate groups and violence on line;
• Internet violence such as viruses, flaming and spamming;  
• Other criminal behavior on line such as hacking to steal, alter or invade personal information property or various copywrite infringements; 

The list of topics could go on and on. 

The directions CyberPsychology could take would be to establish more of a presence in all forms of media but especially in cyberspace.  CyberPsychology may certainly be directed to areas of:

• using computers for on-line therapy;
• information dissemination;
• and, use the Web as a research tool.   

So far, in cyberspace, interested parties have been those who are already involved in the field of psychology, such as psychologists and professors of psychology and their students as well as those who need personal counseling help and have looked to sites on the internet to assist them. 

Others who, if they are not already aware of this field of study, ought to learn about CyberPsychology are those involved in creating web sites, selling on-line, or anyone who wishes to be noticed in cyberspace since CyberPsychology can offer many insights to how people respond to web page designs and the type of information contained. 

Politicians, public relations experts, ambassadors, human rights activists and religious leaders could all benefit from the work and information gathered in CyberPsychology studies.  The form cyberspace takes, the culture and its philosophies created by a worldwide community will definitely have an impact on our nations and political structures.  The affects of certain aspects of cyberspace (privacy, access to ideas, identity, anonymity, etc.) on an individual will have out reaching affects on the way they relate to their community, culture, religion and nation.  It would behoove those in leadership positions to pay attention. 

Sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers, theologists and others interested in the human condition may also find CyberPsychology to be useful in their own intellectual pursuits.

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Almost and essentially authentic but not quite there formally.  This is to some extent a literal explanation, however, how does it apply to cyberspace?   In cyberspace, we are experiencing a new world that is in essence real, deemed virtual reality.  This world is mostly formed by communication of thoughts from the minds of many individuals, thus making it a gathering of minds focused mostly on the cognitive and affective aspects of life.   There are many similarities between brain/computer and mind/cyberspace and I will touch on these in the next section, "The Relationship between Cyberspace and Mind."  Also to be noted in further reports on this page, Sherry Turkle, a sociology professor at MIT, finds much simulation of life in the regions of computerized medium, whether it be a game, educational CD-ROM, Tamagochi toy or cyberspace.   Simulation of reality is, of course, only a depiction or imitation of reality and not actually real. At this point, some ancient philosophical ideas could possibly shed some light on the issue of virtual reality. 

Plato, in his Cave analogy, expressed different levels in which individuals are conscious of the world in which they live. At each level the individual believes s/he is experiencing that which is real.  The lowest level of consciousness is the level of images.  This is the simulation of life, certainly not the real thing -- like a movie.  The second level is that of physical objects: the actual physical, material world.  These first two levels are both of the physical plane.  The next two levels are of the mind or psyche.  Level three is the world of mathematical ideas: it is here that one realizes a world beyond the physical but yet still relates to the physical.  And, finally there is the level of ideals: thought forms, spiritual concepts, other worldly, non-material.  Ultimately, one is brought to the pinnacle of The Good. This level to Plato was that of the truth, the actual, the real. 

How does this analogy relate to virtual reality?  It appears that the participation of an individual in cyberspace can be at any one level or all four levels at the same time.  For example, on the first level of images, a person could immerse himself in a false identity in a Multi User Domain (MUD) room. Here he could spend a significant part of his life and create his personality, social status, livelihood and even gender to be completely different than in real life (IRL). He could convince himself that in the MUD his real identity exists: who he really is is expressed online. However, MUD's are only games, and these games are at best a simulation of life. If he can not maintain the same personality et.al in the physical world, then, no matter how much his ego wants to be the MUD person, it is not really him.

A second level example would be wherein one is conscious of the physical distinctions (person and computer) and pragmatically use the computer as a tool to accomplish business, communication, research or even play games. This person recognizes the material value of computers and the internet but has no concept of anything beyond the practical use of a machine. He may play a game in a MUD room, however, his identity there would only be pretend and he knows it. He could, nevertheless, practice a new behavior in the MUD room and, if he likes the results, apply it IRL and then he would know it is his.

The third level of mathematical concepts can be illustrated with the example of a person who understands the logical, mathematical, electronic workings of a computer and its relation to cyberspace. In a MUD room, this person would be more interested in manipulating programs and working complexity into his room and character, perhaps creating a BOT.

And, finally at the fourth level, would be an individual interested in the philosophical mind to mind relationships, the spiritual concepts of cyberspace and all the creative and expansive potentialities involved. On this level one could experience concepts of mind by contemplating the experience of communal mind. Of course, most people will operate on all levels at the same time, however, one level would probably dominate. Also, it can only exist through participation of individuals and can never be all of life hence, its virtual realness. 

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There is much to be said about the relationship between cyberspace and mind.  We create in our own image and we perceive what we create to be that of our own image.  It is all we are able to do.  As the mind and brain work together, computers and cyberspace work together.  Cyberspace is in its infancy and as much as an infant's mind is free and filters are not yet established to weed out unwanted stimulants, so to is cyberspace.  Cyberspace is free, practically unfiltered and expression of thought and feelings are anonymous, uncensored and numerous.  I predict this will not continue for long.  Search engines, for example, have a position of organizing the access to different sites on the internet and, as such, have a position of control which up to this point has been manageable for them.  Just as a child develops and more concepts need to be categorized and organized in his mind, the more overwhelming cyberspace becomes, the more organizing and filtering will most likely occur. 

Nevertheless, until things change, how people behave online can give us insight as to how people think without the guards of censorship.  How strong are one's ethics, values and /or social kindness when temptations are presented without the consequences?  As people behave with pretension online, are we creating a culture based on conning each other?  The anonymity and privacy of the internet in certain respects seems to allow people who would normally censor certain thoughts and feelings to express them.  How this affects our culture and society remains to be seen. 

In a class discussion, I mentioned that the current stage of cyberspace is similar to the "Wild West" where consequences for actions were few. Many people behaved lawlessly and got away with it. The freedoms presented at that time also created freer thinking and innovations in living. In cyberspace this freedom exists now but already laws are being developed to prevent abuses such as theft, child pornography and the like. (Some students in class opposed my prediction that the internet would not remain as free as it is for long, however, check out this site "The Web's Unelected Government," and decide for yourself.)

Another aspect of the relationship between cyberspace and mind is how it can effect change in an individual.  As James Sempsey, Ph.D.. states in  "The Evolution of Consciousness:"  

Individuals can not be considered as separate from the cultures of which they are members. Humans are symbiotic organisms and, as such could not exist apart from culture. So when we consider change, as it pertains to individuals, we are really discussing states of change within a larger organism as manifested through constituent elements. Individual change is only possible in relation to a social context, and it is the context that causes the change to occur. A non-socially contexted individual, if such could exist, would be no more capable of changing her behavior than an individual roach...Individuals change because new circumstances, by definition, require reconfiguration of the self to previous action schemas. The individual is not a static quantity, but an emergent quality of societal dialectics.

Dr. Sempsey also discusses the importance of learning in our evolutionary tract. Most scientists are stating that we may have come to the pinnacle of our biological evolution, however, as Dr. Sempsey points out sociologically we still evolve and the mechanism that allows us to do this is our ability to learn. Cyberspace provides grand opportunities for social interaction and individual growth and change.  It is also, surprisingly to some, a place where one can not run away from oneself.  John Suler, Ph.D.., explains in   "Cyberspace as Psychological Space:" 

A user will act on unconscious motivations - as well as conscious preferences and choices - in selecting friends, lovers, and enemies. This "transference" guides us towards specific types of people who address our underlying emotions and needs. Pressed by hidden expectations, wishes, and fears, this unconscious filtering mechanism has at its disposal an almost infinite candy store of online alternatives to choose from. As one experienced online user once said to me, "Everywhere I go in cyberspace, I keep running into the same kinds of people!" Carrying that insight one step further, another said, "Everywhere I go, I find.... ME!"  

One student, Leslie Francis, stated, in her generational report that I reviewed,  "It is amazing to me that my thoughts on the subject were echoed by another -- let alone that I FOUND the article in the first place!"  If one understands a little bit about how the mind works, it is not as surprising as it is revealing.  In many ways, cyberspace is very much like the minds of those participating. 

In essence, what comes from a non-physical realm, the mind, transfers thoughts and feelings through the brain, into a computer which puts these thoughts and feelings back out into a non-physical realm - cyberspace. Certainly, there is opportunity for psychologists to study the development of cyberspace as it relates to the mind in a sense that it may be the closest tool that can be used as a reflection of the mind and how it works. It is not surprising that, what we created as a tool to use for thought work, would be fashioned after our own brain and mind.  Already, scientists are researching how to make hypertext work more like synapses in the brain. In this site, "Learning, 'Brain-Like' Webs," there are many links to information on this type of work. What is useful is that we may be able to gain much more understanding of our minds by watching what we create in cyberspace as it unfolds. 

There are many other ways in which the mind and cyberspace relate, one final way that I will review is that of cyberspace's similarity to the collective unconscious.  Just as Ms. Francis found echoes of her ideas in cyberspace, I too found others who related cyberspace to the collective unconscious.  In John Suler's ongoing forum,   Loren Bawn brings up the idea that "the internet represents mankind's attempt to "replicate" the collective unconscious."   Dr.Suler found the idea intriguing and possible however saw cyberspace as closer to the concept of a collective conscious.  And, yet a third writer, Philip H. Farber, added his own concepts on the subject in an essay called "Psychosphere." In my own "Online Generational Curriculum" report, I remarked about the possible connection. Perhaps it can be seen as a simulation of the collective unconscious for those who never visit cyberspace and a replication of collective consciousness (or communal mind) for those who do.

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There were a number of facinating sites that I found in relation to the subject of Cyber-Psychology.  The author of Life on the Screen, Sherry Turkle Ph.D.has been interviewed quite often. One interview with Sherry Turkle Ph.D. explored emotional and intellectual connections to products of the computer age.  She expressed how she, "began to see ways in which ideas about the computer as a model of mind were getting into people's individual ways of    thinking about themselves," she recalls. The computer seemed a perfect liminal object: it was both alive and not alive, both mind and not mind."  In another interview  in Howard Rheingold's "Mind to Mind" page, Dr. Turkle speaks about the world of pervasive simulation.  And, yet in another interview,  with Tom Abate, "Exploring the world of cyber-psychology," she explains the change in perspective of how we view our identity.  At one time, we viewed our self as having a core idea of self the "I", however, now we see different aspects of ourselves as different identities.  Furthermore, as we engage in exchanges on the internet, we may try on new identities and further dissassociate.

Dr. John Suler has a Web site with quite a few pages which have different styles that could interest a broad range of people. His "Behavior On-Line" forum brings up interesting topics of discussion and also has at times, poetry. This link is to a translated poem about cyberspace as experienced by Sergey Lukianenko from Russia. It is called Deep in Trouble. Traveling to the other side of the world, we find Virtual-Communities, Virtual Settlements & Cyber-Archaeology: A Theoretical Outline, by Quentin Jones, at the Department of Business Administration Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Written in journalistic style, this site has an indepth study on Virtual communities. And, since we are traveling all around, here is a link to the  "Atlas of Cyberspaces" this is a site that gives numerous conceptual views of the internet and is highly recommended.

This link is to the "Webmuseum Cyberculture Research Library: Cyberpsychology & Cultural Psychology." It contains many links to Web pages on cyberpsychology and oddly enough our generational curriculum is sited numerous times. And, speaking of generational curriculum work, this site, The Society for Computers in Psychology, should be of interest to most students interested in cyber-psychology since it offers awards for papers written about cyberpsychology.

There are many sites for actual psychological services on-line here are a few samples: This one is "Cyber-Psych - Where The Future of Psychological Care is On-Line" and this one, Psychiatry & Psychotherapy by Richard J. Corelli, M.D., is very nice if you have multi-media capabilities since it plays Pachelbel's Cannon in D while you look through what he offers.

I hope this helps in your search for topics on cyberpsychology. If you need more help try ProFusion, a search engine that searches through all of the most popular search engines at the same time.

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Four excellent generational reports can be found with the following: Kathi Fujii's report, 'Cyberspace and Mind: Identifying some Characteristics of Virtual Reality', which I reviewed in my Generational Curriculum report, Jill Umetsu's, 'Getting Hold of Cyber-psychology,' is well written and easy to follow. Reading her report helped stir thoughts for my own. Leslie Francis's, 'Cyberspace and Mind: Identifying Some Characteristics of Virtual Reality: Virtual, Alternate, or Real,' was also well thought out however, less information. And Ross Takara, has a nicely presented very easily followed and well written report, 'Getting Hold of Cyber-Psychology.'
 

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Dr. Leon James' article, Cyberpsychology: Principles of Creating Virtual Presence, covers a number of topics concerning the mind and its relationship to cyberspace. The first subject is an explanation of hypertext. Hypertext he explains is text "above the normal" and it is displayed "in a fourth dimension relative to normal printed text." Hypertext allows one to travel electronically by clicking on a word. He then brings up some pertinent questions such as, "In what way is hypertext like the mind?"

His next subjects cover the topics of cyberspace in its relation to mind and virtual reality. He points out that some feel threatened by the growing presence of cyberspace due to the lack of face to face contact. However, he suggests that even though a person is immensed in the computer, the great desire to communicate is the motivating factor. He goes on to express that, "computers are convenient and powerful extensions of the human mind." Dr. James goes on to explain that like the mind, cyberspace as a virtual reality has no physical form or mass. It is through interactivity that it exists. He compares two aspects of likeness between mind and cyberspace: interactivity and organization:

Minds interact through organized content. That is, our mind communicates with other minds and the content of the exchange is organized by topic and by attitudes towards the topic. Cyberspace is made up of topics and access doors to these topics... Cyberspace is in effect the communal mind.

This communal mind, Dr. James explains, is created through the linking process which is not and can not be owned by anyone. Ownership does, however, exist in the, "hardware, the copyrighted software, or the intellectual property rights to textual and audiovisual creations."

In the overwhelmingly vast expanse of cyberspace, people do come together and form communities based on a certain topic, a mutual intention or some sort of common interest. These communities form by people navigating through the Web in search of these common interests. Navigation on the Web is made possible, as noted above, by hypertext. URL's are used to link one site with another. Dr. James states that while it is possible to draw a map of the Internet, it is as impossible to chart a map of cyberspace as it is to map out the mind. Cyberspace and the mind are both non-physical, unlimited in size and shape whereas the brain and the Internet are both limited in size and shape. (An interesting site to view concepts of maps of the Internet is located here )

Another analogy Dr. James calls "The Virtual Book," wherein, each page is linked through the table of contents made up of hypertext. A virtual electronic library exists that is unlimited and continually growing. Herein too is a representation of the, "communal mind which is vast in comparison to the individual's mind." Further on, Dr. James explains that when one begins the process of creating a Web page, there are three basic properties that are of importance: appearance, content and access. Just as we are IRL, appearance takes on initial importance. However, if there is no substance to the content then interest in the page will soon wane. And, as any commercial realtor would say "location, location, location," in cyberspace it's "access, access, access."

After explaining the basic concepts of the mind and cyberspace relations, Dr. James goes on to explore the spiritual connection to virtual reality. He proposes that the act of clicking on a link is a spiritual act in and of itself. His explanation for this is thus: The term 'psyche' contains both mind and spirit. Interests and intentions are mind and spirit driven so that action taken due to interests and intentions (such as clicking on a hypertext link) is a spiritual one. By clicking on a link, one is creating a presence in virtual reality and thus keeps up its existence. By making conscious choices on what to click, one is performing moral, ethical, economic and psychological acts. Dr. James continues to explain that while methods are being developed to filter out or block clicking, it would behoove us to develop self-witnessing and self-modification within ourselves in order to create freedom in choice that is educated and from love.

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