An Interdisciplinary Journal on the Social Impacts of New Technologies

Telematics and Informatics is an interdisciplinary journal publishing innovative theoretical and methodological research on the social, economic, geographic, political, and cultural impacts of digital technologies. Application areas include smart cities, sensors and information fusion, the digital society and digital platforms, internet of things (IoT), cyber-physical technologies, privacy, knowledge management, distributed work, emergency response and hazards, mobile and wireless communications, health informatics, psychosocial effects of social media, ICT for sustainable development, blockchain, e-commerce, and e-government.

The Journal favors research papers (8,000 words) but will consider contributions offering systematic review and meta-analysis (10,000 words), as well as research notes (4,000 words) that seek to advance new ideas, theoretical perspectives or methodological approaches.

Telematics and Informatics serves as an international outlet for information scientists, data scientists, computer scientists, social informaticists, geographic information scientists, urban and regional planners, policy analysts, regional scientists, disaster scientists, and network scientists.

Special Issue on Romance and the Internet
提出日: 2026-10-13

The Internet has driven fundamental changes in the landscape of romantic relationships. People increasingly meet new partners online, sustain regular and even long-distance relationships via multiple communicative channels, and sometimes even end relationships through digital media. 

Despite how central online interaction has become for intimacy and love, many core questions remain unanswered. For example, what kind of people turn to online spaces to seek partners, how platform design and algorithms shape partner choice and relationship trajectories, which aspects of the Internet help relationships thrive and which worsen them, and which patterns are culturally specific versus globally shared. Given the amount of time people spend online and the rapid evolution of platform technologies, including generative AI, recommender systems, location services,
and almost constant internet connection through mobile phones, understanding the role the Internet
plays in romance is a pressing and timely research priority.

This special issue will bring together interdisciplinary research that examines the technical, social, cultural, and policy dimensions of digitally mediated romance, with a broader focus on romantic relationships in the Internet era. We welcome contributions that address technical infrastructures, psychosocial consequences, governance and policy, design interventions, and cross-cultural perspectives.

Guest editors:

Dr Marta Kowal
Affiliation: IDN Being Human Lab – Institute of Psychology, University of Wrocław, Wrocław, Poland
Fields of interest: romantic relationships; cross-cultural studies; digital media; social psychology.

Special issue information:

Topics of interest in this special issue would include (but would not be limited to):

    Online dating websites and applications (algorithmic matching and recommender systems)​
    AI-mediated interaction (chatbots, AI-assisted messaging, synthetic personas, and ethical implications)
    Relationship initiation, maintenance, and dissolution in digital environments
    Digital intimacy and mental health (loneliness, attachment, well-being, and health implications)
    Cross-cultural perspectives on internet romance
    The role of the Internet in diverse forms of intimacy (e.g., polyamory, LGBTQ+ relationships)

We will welcome a wide range of methods: digital trace and log-data analyses, experiments (lab andfield), large-scale surveys, longitudinal and behavioral data, policy/legal analyses, systematic reviews,
meta-analyses, and mixed-methods designs.