With the power to gather people with similar interests together, virtual communities have gained attention by not only practitioners, but researchers, as well. Virtual Community Participation and Motivation: Cross-Disciplinary Theories offers in-depth coverage of state-of-the-art research on virtual community participation. This book appeals to those interested not only in virtual communities, but also in virtual worlds, virtual teams, and even online shopping. Virtual community researchers, as well as researchers from diverse fields--computer science, information systems, psychology, sociology, and telecommunications--will find valuable motivation theories discussed in this book.