We hypothesized that people who can better disclose their "true" or inner self to others on the Internet than in face-to-face settings will be more likely to form close relationships on-line and will tend to bring those virtual relationships into their "real" lives. Study 1, a survey of randomly selected Internet newsgroup posters, showed that those who better express their true self over the Internet were more likely than others to have formed close on-line relationships and moved these friendships to a face-to-face basis. Study 2 revealed that the majority of these close Internet relationships were still intact 2 years later. Finally, a laboratory experiment found that undergraduates liked each other more following an Internet compared to a face-to-face initial meeting.

Concern has been raised about the lack of participant compliance in diary studies that use paper-and-pencil as opposed to electronic formats. Three studies explored the magnitude of compliance problems and their effects on data quality. Study 1 used random signals to elicit diary reports and found close matches to self-reported completion times, matches that could not plausibly have been fabricated. Studies 2 and 3 examined the psychometric and statistical equivalence of data obtained with paper versus electronic formats. With minor exceptions, both methods yielded data that were equivalent psychometrically and in patterns of findings. These results serve to at least partially mollify concern about the validity of paper diary methods.

The various forms of Internet groups share many similarities to groups that exist in the offline world, but there are also critical differences. The authors examine traditional definitions of groups and how Internet groups fit into those existing definitions. They provide an analysis of relevant aspects that make virtual groups similar to and different from nonelectronic groups, and they examine the ways in which Internet groups function. Individual motivations for joining online groups and the consequences of virtual group membership are also discussed.

We examined the effects of social hindrance and support on negative and positive relationship-specific feelings in three daily diary studies. Study 1 showed that hindrance and support independently predicted positive relationship feelings, but only hindrance predicted negative feelings. Study 2 used new measures of hindrance and support and showed that hindrance and support independently predicted same-day relationship feelings, but that the effects of hindrance were stronger in magnitude. Study 3 yielded similar findings using the new measures of hindrance and support and controlling for morning feeling. These asymmetrical cross-over effects suggest that bad is only stronger than good when it comes to bad outcomes; they also support the distinction between aversive and appetitive relational processes.

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