ABSTRACT
The Internet is increasingly becoming a space that researchers are viewing not only as an object of research, but also as a tool for conducting research itself. Online, researchers can administer surveys, collect text and images and carry out interviews. The Internet provides researchers with a more readily accessible pool of individuals to study. It also provides easier access to a large number of participants, where one can collect worldwide samples. Researchers can have access to samples that are often more dif®cult to reach (e.g. the elderly, people with disabilities, people in prison and hospital). Moreover, we are privy to more fringe or deviant sexual activities that are not so easily observable of¯ine. In addition, researchers have text readily available to use from e-mails, chat records, discussion boards, and so forth. As Mann and Stewart (2000) rightly claim, the Internet, it would seem, is an ideal place to recruit individuals.
