Community of Practice, Social Learning and Social Presence Model for Sustaining Religious Virtual Community

This study aims to explore theoretical factors in order to increase the sustainability of an online community based on religious value or we termed as a religious virtual community (RVC). Social Presence Theory is the degree by which an individual is perceived to be a ‘real person’ in online communities. Meanwhile, social learning theory states that individuals as humans have a motive to learn to sustain their lives. While, the religious virtual community is an online community with the aim of deepening the study or knowledge of the religious field. We selected Islamic Based Virtual Community which has been so many in our community. The existence of this community will increase knowledge of the religious values of its members. Since, this online community is very beneficial for sharing and caring about religious knowledge, then, we must think about how to sustain this community and prevent harm from the existence of this community. Those three theories lens will be used to develop the factors. Future research agendas are also provided for the direction of future work. This research is expected to give a contribution in an effort to sustain religious virtual communities.