As an increasing amount of communicative activity takes place through this new medium, there has likewise been a significant increase in primary research on virtual communities, online relationships, and a variety of other aspects of computer-mediated communication ( Flaherty, Pearce, & Rubin, 1998 Matheson, 1991 Nonnecke, Preece, Andrews, & Voutour, 2004 Preece, 1999 Preece & Ghozati, 2001 Walther, 1996 Walther & Boyd, 2002 Wood & Smith, 2001 Wright, 2000a, 2002a, 2002b, 2004).
The past decade has seen a tremendous increase in internet use and computer-mediated communication ( Fox, Rainie, Larsen, Horrigan, Lenhart, Spooner, & Carter, 2001 Horrigan, 2001 Nie & Erbring, 2000 Nie, Hillygus, & Erbring, 2002).
