"If ‘acting out’ is going to happen, MUD’s are relatively safe places, since virtual promiscuity never causes pregnancy or disease. But it is also true that, taken by themselves, virtual communities will only sometimes facilitate psychological growth(22).

"With this choice though, an individual creates an artificial environment in which they surround themselves with things that appeal to them. Disagreements can be solved by changing chat rooms or simply disconnecting. This control does not exist in the real world and may cause difficulties for a person and how they choose to see themself. Perhaps this is where the depression associated with high Internet usage stems from(11)."

"The paradox we observe, then is that the Internet is a social technology used for communication with individuals and groups, but it is associated with declines is social involvement and the psychological well-being that goes with social involvement. Perhaps, by using the internet, people are substituting poorer quality social relationships for better relationships, that is, substituting weak for strong ones (e.g., Granovetter, 1973; Krackhardt, 1994). People can support strong ties electronically[, h]owever, many of the on-line relationships in our sample, and especially the new ones, represented weak rather than strong ones(6)."

"Because on-line friends are not embedded in the same day-to-day environment, they will be less likely to understand the context for conversation, making discussion more difficult (Clark, 1996) and rendering support less applicable. Even strong ties maintained at a distance through electronic communication are likely to be different in kind and perhaps diminished in strength compared with strong ties supported by physical proximity (Wellman & Wortley, 1990)(7)."

"Just as with non-electronic group identities(e.g., Deaux, 1996), virtual groups are important to the daily lives of their members, and virtual group identities become an important part of the self.… Similarly, the changes in identity caused by virtual group membership (and especially participation) had ramifications for the [marginalized-concealable] individual’s real-life relationships, making him or her more likely to share this previously hidden identity. This bi-directional flow of influence between the two spheres belies the claim by many (e.g., Beninger, 1987; Stoll, 1995[; Kraut, 1998]) that the Internet can only give the illusion of community–that social activity via the computer serves only to increase isolation and to cause the deterioration of the individual’s real-life relationships(31)."

"With the increased sense of isolation, one may even begin to think of oneself as immune to emotional ties, much like a machine. The person may be able to function in the course of daily life (assuming physical needs are fulfilled) as a machine does, but the person/machine will not be able to really think beyond the usual course of events. To simply stuff food and sleep into ourselves just to keep going, without any healthy dreams or hopes or joys, can’t be a fulfilling life. We are not machines; we are living beings who need to interact on a deep level with each other. Technology, in the form of CMC and other indirect long distance interactions, has not provided a fully coherent alternative to our traditional relationships(12)."