A Note From The Editors

For more than a decade, the Journal of Rural Community Psychology, published by the California School of Professional Psychology in Fresno, California, was a valuable resource for clinicians, academicians and researchers interested in rural psychology. Although roughly 25% of the population of the United States can be reasonably referred to as "rural", relatively few mental health oriented professionals have focused on issues relevant to this diverse, under-served and almost silent population. None the less, the loss of the Journal of Rural Community Psychology, as a result of high publication costs and low subscribership, was keenly felt by the few.

The JRCP is back, but there have obviously been changes. To meet the needs of the few in a cost effective way, JRCP will be an on-line journal. Also, in the hope of increasing the number of interested subscribers, we are providing JRCP without cost. Beginning with the current issue, JRCP will be published electronically, under new editors, and located at Marshall University, Huntington, West Virginia. Marshall has a major commitment to the development of rural health care delivery, such as the emphasis on family practice in the School of Medicine. As such, we feel that the aims of the JRCP are consonant with this mission. Also, we gratefully acknowledge the University's support, by providing the computer facilities necessary to establish and maintain JRCP as an ongoing endeavor.

We are also broadening our horizons. In this first on-line edition, readers will find articles written by anthropologists, sociologists and psychologists. Articles themselves range from empirical to commentary in scope.

JRCP is both old and new, and we intend to shape it to meet subscriber needs. Plans for the future include providing information about upcoming conferences, and continuing education opportunities related to rural issues. We are requesting your feedback and your comments, and will publish representative items. Help us to provide you with a valuable resource. JRCP is your journal, and will be what you make of it.

It has been a lot of work to get this first issue ready, and very much a learning adventure. But, it is truly rewarding to see it finally come together. We hope that you find the content worthwhile and interesting. Certainly, we look forward to your feedback about what you find here.

There are two groups of people we would like to thank, for their help in making this first issue possible. Without both authors and reviewers, JRCP could not exist. So, we would like to thank our associates who kindly agreed to review manuscripts, providing thoughtful and timely responses, and for their patience as we tried to work out the best format in which to distribute articles.

Our thanks are also extended to the authors. It takes a certain amount of courage to do something new and different, and we are grateful that they were willing to try this medium of communication. We appreciate their vote of confidence in us, and hope that they do not feel it was misplaced. We look forward to future contributions from them, and hope that many of you will become JRCP authors.

So now, we offer it to you, our readers. Thanks for your patience, and we hope you feel it was worth the wait. Please let us know what you think - what you like, what you don't like, and how we can better serve you. We hope bigger and better things are in the offing for JRCP, and are looking forward to finding where this, with your help, will take us.

The Editors