In Yee and Bailenson's article "The Proteus Effect: The Effect of Transformed Self-Representation on Behavior (2007)," a pair of studies were conducted during which individuals were assigned an avatar that was either attractive or unattractive and made to interact in a collaborative virtual environment. Each user is aware of only "their" version of the digital rendering; in other words, the target may perceive their avatar as attractive, whereas a perceiver sees the target as unattractive. This was done to minimize the possibility of behavioral confirmation (in this case, mutual perception of attractiveness and both target and perceiver responding accordingly).
The basis of the Proteus Effect is the expectation that individuals will conform to the behavior that others expect them to have based on the stereotyped identity of their avatars. Yee and Bailenson put forth three hypotheses:
1st Study
-Interpersonal distance - according to Burgoon's (1978) nonverbal expectancy theory, when attractive individuals violate 'nonverbal expectancies' (e.g. moving into someone's personal space), "the positive valence that is created can be socially advantageous." Assuming attractive individuals are more confident, they would more readily approach others and stand in closer proximity than individuals perceiving themselves as unattractive.
-Self-disclosure - because attractive individuals are more likely to be extroverted and more friendly, they would be exhibit higher self-disclosure and volunteer more information about themselves overall.
2nd Study
- According to literature on attractiveness, taller people are perceived to be more competent, more desirable romantic partners, and possess leadership qualities. The third hypothesis assumes that individuals with avatars in the tall condition would behave in a more confident manner.
To test these hypotheses, I entered the game Second Life, a 3-D virtual world that is almost entirely user-built and populated by millions of individual players. Since there is no specific goal or purpose of the game aside from exploration and interaction with others, I figured it would be the ideal space.
I created my avatar to be very stereotypically attractive and completely unrelated to my actual appearance: blond hair, blue eyes, slender and relatively tall. Once I found a decently populated area (it didn't take long), in most cases, I didn't even have to initiate conversation since other users approached me almost immediately. According to Yee and Bailenson's first hypothesis, I would be more likely to stand closer to those I interacted with. I definitely stood closer to other people than I ever would face-to-face, however, I would say that this has less to do with the attractiveness of my avatar and more to do with the fact that a) the controls were slightly awkward, and b) there were so many players in this particular area that my avatar kept getting "bumped" in one direction or the other, so the closeness was usually unintentional.
In terms of self-disclosure, I am not prone to divulging information about myself to strangers online or offline, so no increase in this area occurred. With regards to height, I doubt this can be accurately assessed given that the point of the game is to approach others and communicate and, in my case, others more readily approached me. Any increase in confidence can be attributed to the fact that this was conducted in an online environment, and various other theories predict a higher degree of extroversion and self-disclosure based on the relative anonymity inherent to most online spaces (Joinson 2001). What's also notable is the fact that I was able to choose my avatar, customize it down to the finest detail, and was perfectly aware of how it appeared to others whereas the individuals involved in the Yee and Bailenson study were pre-assigned avatars. In short, these theories seem to apply situationally and seem to be a better predictor of the behavior of others (note how readily others approached my avatar - this may be due to attractiveness on some level). Either way, there are too many variables involved in this case to be able to support or negate what the studies proposed.
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2 comments:
Hi Milan -
I definitely liked the way you proposed that there are too many variables to support Yee and Bailenson's 'simulation-oriented' observations. I also made an 'attractive' avatar, but I made some features similar to mine in real life to be able to come up with a credible comparison in my behaviors. I guess this helps in eliminating variables and takes on more of a simulation-oriented path. It would be interesting to pin-point exactly which variables are significant in coming up with different assertions on the Proteus effect.
I really enjoyed your post! I liked that you first explained the theories and then applied them. I really like the way that you described the movements of your avatar and the ability to actually control its movements online as the reason for why you were standing so close to other avatars. This is a really interesting reasoning that I had never really thought of before, but it makes so much sense. It was difficult for me to control my avatar as well! Some movements were extremely jerky, so when I tried to move forward, my avatar would move much further than i actually wanted her to!
I also like how you chose to look at the height variable that Yee and Bailenson mention. Height is an interesting factor because it relates back to the study we learned about weeks ago regarding how men choose to lie most about their height. I think it is really interesting that we can bring in theories of deception to what we are learning about now in virtual territories such as Second Life.
Good post!!
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