Unterstützungsleistungen im Kommunikationsraum Internet : eine Fallstudie zu einer Selbsthilfegruppe

The dissertation deals with questions of social support in the communicational space of the
Internet in form of a case-study of a self-help-newsgroup. Based on concepts of social
support, exchange-theories and a detailed description of the specials of Computer-mediatedcommunication
all 120 threads and 1055 articles of a chosen newsgroup in a defined period
were researched in several methodical steps. In a first quantitative content-analysis chosen
aspects of newsgroup-communication were described, including the aspect of explicit request
for and giving of help. In a second qualitative methodical step the found help-articles were
decoded, considering a typology of social support. Based on these two steps a further thesis
was developed: There is – beyond the explicit help – implicite and latent social support even
in those articles that were not defined as “help-articles”.
In a third step three thread-sequences with 42 articles were proofed about this thesis. This
happened by a qualitative explicative content-analysis. It coul be found out that the
newsgroup gives support e.g. in form of advice and information, but also giving the
opportunity to get to know others, to cope with a stigma by exchanging with others about
questions of identity. To communicate in a newsgroup gives one also the ability to produce
himself in a way that is subjectively wished. To substitute missing social relations in “real
life” can also mean the danger of a moratorium of the stigma, because there are tendencies
identifiable that the participants even wall stronger against people in their social surrounding.