CALL FOR CHAPTER PROPOSALS

Extended Proposal Submission Deadline: April 13, 2010

Virtual Community Participation and Motivation: Cross-Disciplinary Theories

A book edited by Dr. Honglei Li

Swansea University, United Kingdom

 

To be published by IGI Global: http://www.igi-global.com/requests/details.asp?ID=762

 

Introduction

This book intends to give a comprehensive view on virtual community participation.  With the power to gather people with similar interests together, virtual communities have gained attention by not only practitioners, but researchers, as well. Various studies have been done to explore why people participate in virtual communities since it is only after aggregating a certain amount of members that a virtual community can be viable. Virtual community participation refers to those behaviours in which members mainly participate. Basically, past researchers have found two types of behaviours: lurking and active participation. Although many studies discussed the motivations to participate in virtual communities, including gift economy, pursuit of power, sense of belonging, sense of inclusion, relationship building, and so forth, none of them have given a clear and comprehensive framework on the reasons for virtual community participation. As the field is now in a position to call for a synthesis publication to integrate all aspects of virtual community participation theories, it’s important to edit a book to give both researchers and general virtual community practitioner the theoretical guidelines. This book will bring together the issues that managers, practitioners, and researchers must consider when planning, implementing, and managing members in virtual communities.

 

Objective of the Book

The book gives in-depth coverage of state-of-the-art research on virtual community participation. It first covers the concept of virtual community participation, followed by several streams of virtual community participation theories. It will be written for professionals, researchers, practitioners, and designers who want to improve their understanding of the strategic role of virtual community participation within the development of digital communication.

 

Target Audience

This book appeals to those interested not only in virtual communities, but also in virtual worlds, virtual teams, and even online shopping. Virtual community researchers, as well as researchers from diverse fields--computer science, information systems, psychology, sociology, and telecommunications--will find valuable motivation theories discussed in this book. But this book appeals to more than just researchers. Practitioners and managers looking to organize virtual communities efficiently and effectively will also benefit from the case discussions, empirical studies, and data analysis. In addition, upper-level and graduate-level students will find this research useful in their course work and research. Finally, this book will be a welcome addition to academic libraries' research collections.

 

Recommended topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

--Virtual community participation behavior definition

--Discussion of various virtual community behaviors

--The interpersonal relationship reason of virtual community participation

--The social capital perspective of virtual community participation

--The attachment of virtual community participation

--The belonging or inclusion perspective of participation

-- Gift economy perspective of virtual community participation

--Frameworks to explain virtual community participation

--Behavior theories

--Social psychological perspective of virtual community participation

--The power side of virtual community participation

--Knowledge management motivation to participation

--The communicational perspective to participate

--The psychological perspective to participate

--The process virtualization perspective to participate

 

Submission Procedure

Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before February 13, 2010, a 2-3 page chapter proposal clearly explaining the mission and concerns of his or her proposed chapter. Authors of accepted proposals will be notified by February 28, 2010 about the status of their proposals and sent chapter guidelines. Full chapters are expected to be submitted by April 13, 2010. All submitted chapters will be reviewed on a double-blind review basis. Contributors may also be requested to serve as reviewers for this project. Additional information about this can be found at: http://www.igi-global.com/requests/details.asp?ID=762.

 

Publisher

This book is scheduled to be published by IGI Global (formerly Idea Group Inc.), publisher of the “Information Science Reference” (formerly Idea Group Reference), “Medical Information Science Reference,” “Business Science Reference,” and “Engineering Science Reference” imprints. For additional information regarding the publisher, please visit www.igi-global.com. This publication is anticipated to be released in 2010.

 

Important Dates

April 13, 2010: Proposal Submission Deadline

May 28, 2010: Notification of Acceptance

July 13, 2010: Full Chapter Submission

August 30, 2010: Review Results Returned

September 13, 2010: Final Chapter Submission

September 30, 2010:  Final Deadline

 

Editorial Advisory Board Members:

TBA

 

Inquiries and submissions should be forwarded electronically (Word document) to:

Dr. Honglei Li

School of Business & Economics

Swansea University

Singleton Park, Swansea, SA2 8PP

United Kingdom

Tel.: +44 (0) 1792295680 • Fax: +44 (0) 1792295626 

E-mail: hongleili@gmail.com or H.Li@swansea.ac.uk

Dr. Honglei Li 

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Lecturer in Information Systems

School of Business and Economics

University of Wales Swansea

Singleton Park

Swansea

SA2 8PP, Wales, UK.

Tel. +44(0)1792 295680 +44(0)787 2653330

Email: h.li@swansea.ac.uk; hongleili@gmail.com

Homepage: http://swansea.academia.edu/HongleiLi

http://www.swan.ac.uk/staff/academic/BusinessEconomics/lihonglei/