Studying Social Capital in the New Communitarian Horizon: A Multi-Method Research Strategy

Abstract

Characterized by the virtualization vs. materialization of the social interaction spaces, current communitarian scenarios set a series of doubts about how new technologies are transforming the ability of humans to associate with others over space and time. This uncertain atmosphere takes our methodological approaches for studying virtual communities to the study of the communitarian environment through the analysis of essential attributes that determine the existence of a community: social capital. This chapter presents a multi-method research strategy that allows the study of the social capital in these hybrid communities, in which the only stable element to perform the analysis is the person, understood as the central node where different social groups converge in physical and virtual interaction nets and where ultimately communitarian feelings are cherished.