What is PsychNology?

The term PsychNology results from the merge of two words, Psychology and Technology, and has been chosen in order to indicate the tight relationship connecting them. The virtual community that gathers under this name is interested in observing, analyzing and exploring technology from the vantage point of Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology, Cognitive Science, Cultural Studies, Arts, Human Factors, Literature, Communication Studies, Education, History, Economy, Philosophy. The community does not have a physical headquarter and the project does not have any lucrative goal per se: PsychNology has been established to favor the horizontal distribution of knowledge and scientific advances in this wide topic area. Access to the website, the community and the resources are then free of any charge.

The PsychNology project articulates across three different areas, which are described below.

The Journal:

a scientific on-line journal. Each number is composed of a series of peer-reviewed articles on a specified target (which in the first issue will be 'usability in digital environments') and on other themes of interest, a review paper, various multimedia contributions. The authors are researchers, practitioners, operators, scholars from different academies, research institutes and companies around the world. The desire is to share competence and perspectives on the relationship between humans and technologies, giving visibility to innovative and creative work.

Resources:

this area offers several resources: original material and researches, bibliographic references of interest to the community, selected web sites, updated lists of conferences, a glossary of psychNological terms, and (forthcoming) a 3D multimedia gallery with indications on cuttings edge technologies.

Community:

the virtual community is certainly the propelling force of the project. It collects people interested in a series of themes, mediates the exchange of information among experts and users, sustains initiatives of common interest, disseminates methods and professional experience. It is an 'open source' community, in which members can discuss, imagine, plan… About 45 researchers have joined this project since 2001, mostly Italian, but it is gaining an international status and will debut as an International Psychnology Community soon. Techno culture is here !! Join Us !!!!

Psychnology has been established in 2000 by Luciano Gamberini, Anna Spagnolli e Giuseppe Riva during the SIGRAPH conference in Los Angeles. It can currently count on an Editorial Board of about 15 researchers and on a young and dynamic editorial staff. The first of July 2002 the project is officially launched on the Internet.

Having said so, we would like to turn the question to you: what is PsychNology? We're waiting for your contributions.