Doing emotions and displaying empathy: the construction of online peer support

Abstract

A variety of computer-mediated health support groups populate the internet. The aim of Chapter 5 is to compare the ways to do emotions and to display empathy in two online mental health forums: one dedicated to borderline personality disorder (BPD) and the other to eating disorders (ED). The analysis focuses on the use of the perceptual verb ‘to feel’ in both sites. Two patterns of expression of emotions, related to the particularities of each mental health condition, emerged. For the participants in the ED forum, bodily sensations superseded emotions, to the point that the discursive construction of the self was dependent on their physical perceptions. In the BPD group, emotionally bounded states were the main concern shared by members to relate to each other and to somehow anchor an unstable sense of self. In both communities, feelings and emotions were embedded in empathic displays when providing highly person-centred support.