A collaboration between The Relational School and The Freud Museum London, exploring the impact that social networking has had on our society and how it is profoundly influencing our lives.

Over the past decade the very nature of the way we relate to each other has been utterly transformed by online social networking and the mobile technologies that enable unfettered access to it. Our very selves have been extended into the digital world in ways previously unimagined, offering us instantaneous relating to others over a variety of platforms like Facebook and Twitter. In ‘The Psychodynamics of Social Networking’, Aaron Balick draws on his experience as a psychotherapist and cultural theorist to interrogate the unconscious motivations behind our online social networking use: powerfully arguing that social media is not just a technology, but is essentially human and deeply meaningful.

'The Psychodynamics of Social Networking' is the first book to be published in the new series "Psychoanalysis and Popular Culture" produced by the Media and the Inner World research network [MiW] and Karnac Books.

Dr Aaron Balick is a UKCP registered psychotherapist, supervisor and a media and social networking consultant working in London. Aaron is also an honorary lecturer at the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies at the University of Essex where he participates in the post-graduate MA and PhD programmes in psychoanalytic studies. He writes for both academic and lay audiences having published several academic articles and book chapters while at the same time contributing a psychological angle on national press and radio. Aaron is a media spokesperson for the UKCP and a regular contributor as the "resident psychotherapist" on BBC Radio One's phone-in show, The Surgery with Aled and Dr. Radha.

Susie Orbach is a psychoanalyst, writer and social critic. She co-founded The Women's Therapy Centre in 1976, has consulted to NHS, The World Bank and other organisations. She is convenor of www.endangeredbodies.org. She is Chair of the Relational School and the author of eleven books. She was Visiting Professor at LSE and a Guardian columnist for ten years. She is a member of the Government's expert panel on body image.

The Relational School is dedicated to understanding the therapeutic relationship and the uses of the inter-subjective space that is co-created within the therapeutic dyad. Our activities aim to create forums for further conversations around relationality coming from a variety of therapeutic disciplines as well as a formal association to disseminate the work.