Partnership

This issue of Forum examines the topic of “partnership” from a specific vantage point. It addresses how love relationships, partnerships and sexuality are changing as a result of the Internet, and how they might continue to change. It also looks into the array of options this medium offers for getting to know people and how these options are used. The medical historian Tilmann Walter contemplates the social-histo rical evolution of love and sexuality since the early modern era and shows how the availability of pornography on the Internet has radically changed sexual morals within just two decades, while the underlying moral con ceptions of relationships have remained surprisingly stable. Nicola Döring, who has carried out in-depth analyses of the social psychology of the Internet in her various research projects, describes in detail the characteristics, opportunities and risks of relationship initiation through the Internet.