Sense of Community

Blanchard suggests that when participants experience a feeling of community, they are more likely to increase or maintain their participation in the virtual communities. This seems logical as I would expect the same to occur in real life communities. Within Blanchards article there are two lists of characteristics which make up a sense of community in real life communities and in virtual communities, whilst there are subtle differences, I would overall say that there is a strong similarity between the two.

For instance, McMillan and Chavis (1986) suggest that feelings of being supported by others in the community and also supporting them are important, whilst in virtual communities numerous researchers have suggests that exchange of support among members consists a sense of community, for example Bavm, 1995, 1997, Greer, 2000, Preece, 1999, Rheingold, 1993. To me this indicates that there are universal characteristics which create a sense of community, whether this be online or offline. This again reflects the idea that online communication is as worthwhile as offline communication, as feelings created by online communication are equally as “real” as those created offline, as mentioned in a blog last week.

In realtion to an online community I used to use before it shut down due to lack of funding, I would agree that a sense of support was one of the reasons why I felt a sense of community towards this forum. Whilst there were inevitably the few people who'd always attempt to generate controversy, in general and with the users who I mainly had discussions with, there was a strong sense of community in that you would often see the same people posting, and would get an idea of their personalities and who they were from the posts they made and the things they would say and do. As you would always expect to hear from the same people this meant that there was an element on consistency, which I think drew me back to the forum for about a year.