Abstract
Online communities allow problem drinkers to seek help anonymously without the judgement present in the face-to-face world. This article investigates peer to peer online support in an online community of self-identified problem drinkers. A content analysis was performed on a "Stop Drinking" Reddit.com community and 26 themes of interaction, belonging to 9 categories were identified as key interactions likely to provide value to those seeking to instantiate or maintain sobriety. These themes were arranged into a conceptual model consisting of three dimensions of interaction namely: goal-based interaction; relationship-based interactions; and platform-interactions. The conceptual model created by this research should help those in recovery utilize online communities more effectively and provide insight into how peer to peer online social support can be deliberately utilized to promote sobriety.
Recommended Citation
Velmurugan, Mythreyi and Watson, Jason, "Online mediated sobriety: a conceptualization of the peer to peer social support mechanisms in an online "Stop Drinking" community" (2017). ACIS 2017 Proceedings. 53.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/acis2017/53