I thought you might find this of interest. On a related note, I am looking to link up researchers and practitioners looking to document lessons on how to intentionally raise new and more representative voices online (noting how "those who already show up" appear to be even more dominate online with civic participation online overall - http://bit.ly/pewcivic ). Drop me a note: clift@e-democracy.org - In subject write "New Voices Research" - Steven Clift, E-Democracy.org Why We Engage How Theories of Human Behavior Contribute to Our Understanding of Civic Engagement in a Digital Era Eric Gordon Jesse Baldwin-Philippi Martina Balestra A Berkman Center for Internet & Society working paper: http://bit.ly/digiciviclitreview
From Eric Gordon's blog post linked above:
"What happens when democratic processes are augmented by digital communication? What are the political, civic and social conditions that necessitate new tools and new approaches? How is trust generated and distributed differently across digital networks than across physical ones? These questions fundamentally cut across disciplines. So we set out to review the literature on human behavior and civic engagement across multiple fields in the social sciences, including communications, social psychology, behavioral economics and sociology, with the goal of establishing a groundwork on which the field of civic media can be built. Despite our grand aspirations, however, the document we produced did not end up defining a field; but it does, I hope, bring together some foundational research and terms that can spark debate in what is clearly an emerging field. This literature review is meant to clarify common questions and concerns, and provide some background into the rich literature that preceded our current moment of crisis where we are collectively confronted with the need to understand how digital media is transforming democracy and civic life."