Hayleigh Hotshot Meets Second Life

For the tenth assignment, I chose to experience Second Life for the first time. Yee and Bailenson performed a study on the Proteus effect: the effect of transformed self-representation on behavior. Their main assertion is that our self representations are a significant and instantaneous impact on our behavior. Specifically, they claim that the appearances of our avatars shape how we interact with others. Keeping Yee and Bailenson’s studies in mind, I strategically constructed Hayleigh Hotshot to give me credible grounds for analyzing her appearance’s effect on my behavior on Second Life.

I purposely made Hayleigh Hotshot noticeably attractive with desirable attributes. At the same time, I tried to make her somewhat similar to me in real life so I could observe any differences with my behavior on Second Life and my behavior in real life. At first, when I was going through the tutorial, I was a bit frustrated because I didn’t understand what I had to do and I didn’t get a chance to interact with anyone. Soon enough I found that once I was off the initial island, there was never a dull moment in my Second Life experience.

Now it may be that I was more confident than I normally would have been in real life because, looking at my avatar, I felt ‘pretty’ and I guess the other people behind the avatars surrounding me caught on to that spunky confidence right away. Through one of their studies, Yee and Bailenson observed that participants who had more attractive avatars exhibited increased self-disclosure and were more willing to approach opposite-gendered strangers. My experience was consistent with this observation. In real life, I am usually shy when I interact with the opposite sex and it takes a long time before I am willing to open up to others. It was somewhat a surprise to me that when I went on Second Life as Hayleigh Hotshot, I immediately acted more attractively. From my experience in high school and college, I assumed that girls who were approachable and bubbly generally appealed to the opposite sex. Therefore, when others approached me in Second Life, I was very open and honest, disclosing personal interests that I never would have in real life.

Another factor that affected my behavior was the fact that I am 4’11 in real life, but I made my avatar 5’4. Oddly enough, those extra five inches did quite a bit to boost my confidence. Yee and Bailenson observed in another simulation that taller avatars were more confident in negotiation-oriented situations. In a way, I was more confident and took on the attitude of feeling like I was entitled to special treatment and a greater amount of respect from others just because I was taller. I definitely noticed that I got more attention from avatars of the opposite sex than female avatars that were shorter than me. I was also a lot more confident than the shorter female avatars.

In conclusion, Yee and Bailenson’s simulations surprisingly lined up with my experiences on Second Life. I was surprised because when I read the article I thought it was ridiculous to think that the appearance of an avatar could influence one’s interaction with others in an online environment. The Second Life and Yee and Bailenson’s studies opened my eyes and made me aware of the reality of online environments and the effects of self-representation on individual behavior, self-disclosure and inclination to interact with the opposite sex.

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/assignment-10-not-my-second-life.html

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-free-warcraft-for-ex-cons.html

Assignment 10: Feared and Revered

I decided to play the MMORPG, City of Heroes, where the game space is fashioned like a metropolis that you would find in the comic books. The purpose of the game is to join forces with other heroes to defeat various villains throughout the game. Over time, with the completion of missions, you will level up which advances your superpowers. The central location is the courthouse where the other superhero characters congregate to meet each other. Sometimes people are sitting there trying to find other people to play with, other times you can find people just socializing or dancing with themselves. At a certain time of day, you can even find the avatars engaging in a costume contest. The superheroes ranged from figments of peoples’ imaginations to archetypes of famous superheroes, such as Superman and Wonderwomen.

Upon starting the game, you must start your own superhero. I decided to be a vampire, who decided to turn into a Superhero—similar to a female Blade. I tried to make her look like a Vampire through giving her gray skin, red eyes, and dressing her in bad-ass gothic clothing; she wore tight black leather pants, tall boots, and a shirt with lots of straps all over it. Also, I tired to make her superpowers match her character; I gave her the power of dark melee, because vampires often have super-strength and they are magical creatures, and I gave her the super-jump power because over time she would learn how to fly, another aspect characteristic of vampires. Since I did not feel like finding a team, I asked my friend to play with me. He made himself into a Juggernaut-type character and off into the game we went.

When I entered the game, I felt more like a villain than a superhero. My costume was dark and dreary and Paragon City was a bright place filled with colorful people. I instantly felt the effects of behavioral confirmation. Behavioral confirmation is “the process whereby the expectation of one person case another person to behave in ways that confirm the perceiver’s expectations.” The majority of the characters did not approach me, I am assuming because of my evil appearance; which in turn, lead me to be more antisocial. My partner and I stayed away from the populated areas and I just assumed my role as the aloof evil character. Only some of the other malevolent characters would shout random comments. It became apparent at that point that there were certain group norms for this psychological space. The stereotype was that the dark or evil looking heroes were solemn, unfriendly, completely unapproachable, and were often rude. You could tell the difference in the characters by looking around the courthouse. The “dark” heroes were often somberly grouped together and they showcased their powerful dark magic; whereas the other “typical” heroes were socializing and dancing. As I tested the waters, I found that it was easy to be initiated into the typical hero group—you just had to be friendly.

But I did not want to be part of the typical heroes, I wanted to be a dark hero, feared and revered. My reason for this desire is the fact that I was trying to portray a vampire, how would anyone ever believe I was a vampire if I was prancing around and smiling like a nymph. Therefore, I changed my behavior to mimic that of the dark group: I did not dance, smile, or laugh and I kept my conversations short and quick. My next step into being accepted was leveling up my dark magic powers, so I could be recognized. In this case, it is difficult to discern whether my behavior followed SIDE theory or the Proteus Effect. SIDE theory argues that “factors that lead to deindividuation, such as anonymity, might thus reinforce group salience and conformity to group norms,” whereas Proteus effect emphasizes “conformity to individual identity cues.” Although I was conforming to the local group norms of the “dark” heroes (SIDE theory), the behaviors that I decided to replicate were based on my vampire avatar (Proteus Effect).

Assignment 10 - Not my Second Life

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.

Comment one
Comment two

10 Free Warcraft for Ex-Cons

The US currently has 2.2 million prisoners at any given time, more than any other country in the world. And according to the USDOJ, 67.5% of released criminals are rearrested for felonies within the next three years. After subtracting out the 128,000 inmates currently serving life sentences, we are looking at approximately 1.47 million of those 2.2 million being rearrested within the next three years.

Now, we know that the cost of the federal government housing a prisoner comes out to $23476.80 per year. So here is my brilliant plan to reduce recidivism rates and save the taxpayers money: whenever a career criminal is released back into society, give them a copy of World of Warcraft and a free 1 year subscription. This works out to around $160 per person, but I'm sure the government could swing a pretty good volume discount. At this rate, the cost of housing one prisoner for a year works out to around 150 WoW subscriptions.

Simple math tells us that if we could reduce recidivism by just 1%, we could save the taxpayers a huge amount of money, not to mention reduce the level of violent crime in society. And when you consider the average WoW player logs almost eight hours a day, this seems like a very real possibility.

Of course you might say, "But Alex, won't giving career criminals an addictive video game prevent them from getting real jobs?" Yes! But don't forget that the career of a career criminal is committing crime, so this is exactly the idea.

The paper by Yee & Balenson suggests that by tweaking the appearance of the avatar, we can alter the way in which the user behaves. Although further testing is needed, this result suggests that we could potentially rehabilitate criminals by encouraging prosocial behavior online. The authors also talk about SIDE theory in this context. Perhaps by giving prisoners a positive social identity and deindividuating them, we could train them in good behavior. The authors do note precedence for this, saying that people in a dark room were more likely to engage in acts of physical affection, showing that deindividuation can lead to good behavior as well as bad.

As Raph Koster says, "Glory is the reason why people play online; shame is what keeps them from playing online. Neither is possible without other people being present." Perhaps by creating a compelling online experience for former criminals we can subconsciously rehabilitate them, or at the very least keep them in front of the computer. After all, better to have them killing dragons in real game than raping little kids in real life.

While it is only a small part of the picture, I believe that Yee & Bailenson provide an excellent framework for creating a prosocial experience through both their work on Proteus theory and also their new results using the existing SIDE model.

Utopia Redux

Last week I wrote about the addictive properties of Swirve.com's online multiplayer text-based game, Utopia, and how it had monopolized my life as a kid. But writing about it piqued my interest and, on a lark, I signed up for a new account. ("I'll just see what's changed and what's the same," I told myself. "I'm sure it won't be addictive anymore.")

It still is. My "province," which I named Ken-etic Energy, has doubled in size under my frequent and devoted attention (from 400 to 800 acres). My population of Humans has already grown to support: a strong network of thieves, who have already managed to save peasant lives by robbing other provinces of food and supplanting my Farms with it; a (weaker) network of wizards, who usually blow themselves up trying to cast spells but sometimes succeed nonetheless; and a powerful cabal of Knights and Archers who defend my province against enemy attack. I'm the gallant ruler: Lord Ezra the Wealthy. As a Human, my province isn't great at magic but has a knack for Science; as a Merchant, I get extra income that I can use to pay for soldier training and the exploration of new lands. All together, this makes me, Ken Colwell, a huge dork who will probably not allow this blog post to be posted beyond December.

So I play in a kingdom of Orcs, Dark Elves, and the occasional Gnome besides my fellow humans. Does it change how I interact with them that I chose this Human, Merchant persona? I don't think so--I am a sensibly-minded Human. I almost wish I'd picked an Orc or a Dark Elf province so I could be a little more evil. The other day, I almost wrote a random, archaically-worded message to a random province, just to test for a reaction, but then I thought--would a Human Merchant say that? No way. That would ruin the game. Honestly, the game hasn't been social enough for me to say if Behavioral Confirmation could be working here: whose beliefs would I be confirming? I think my kingdommates are still waiting to see if I'm going to man up and log in for the long haul. As for SIDE, the only way I can identify with my kingdom is if a friend gets attacked and I help him fight back, but I'm not powerful enough to do that. (I do, however, get uncharacteristically upset when that happens. Am I identifying with the group?) And the Proteus Effect is hard to search for when Utopia doesn't even give me a graphical avatar. All I've got are the words Human, Merchant, and Ezra. But soon those words will be known throughout all cyberspace. Maybe fame will affect how I act.

By the way--honestly, this post is a little tardy, but that's only because we're gearing up for War with a kingdom on another island. I need to stay focused. If I don't get my Soldiers trained into Specialists, I won't stand a chance, and my Thieves stand ready to rob the vaults of an unsuspecting province with full coffers. Please try not to disturb me for the next couple weeks.

Assignment 10: Second Life as a Rodent is Never Easy

Description
As a newbie on Second Life, I accidentally chose to be a short female raccoon, thinking that it would be cute to be a rodent. I entered a popular space called “Best Skin, Clothes, Shape” and found that I was one of the most unattractive virtual beings. I walked up to a group of “fashionable” people sitting around a table smoking and tried joining the conversation but once they saw that I was a raccoon they stopped interacting with me. I then tried making my raccoon-self sexy by making my skirt tighter and exposing more fur but that only made the people around the table actually get up and move away from me. For the rest of the hour I sat alone, talking and gesturing to myself.

Analysis
Second Life is a 3-D virtual game in which users interact with each other through motional avatars (digital representation of themselves), which they can choose and customize. It is one of the many virtual environments that increasingly allow users to alter their avatars dramatically and without much effort. According to the Proteus Effect, an individual’s behavior conforms to their avatar choice independent of how others perceive them. Or more precisely, they will conform to the behavior that they believe others would expect them to have (ex. stereotypes). To study the effects of the Proteus Effect, Yee & Bailenson conducted a study in which they tested three hypotheses by focusing on the following measures.

1. Interpersonal distance- According to nonverbal expectancy violations theory, when attractive individuals move too close to someone, the positive valence that is created can be socially advantageous. Therefore, users with attractive avatars will walk closer to the counterpart than those with unattractive avatars.

2. Self-disclosure- Attractive individuals tend to be more extraverted and friendlier. Therefore, users with attractive avatars would exhibit higher self-disclosure and present more pieces of information about themselves than participants with unattractive avatars.

3: Taller people are perceived to be more competent. Therefore, users with taller aviators would behave in a more confident manner and negotiate more aggressively than those with shorter avatars.

Based on my experience playing Second Life, I found that the altered self-representation did have an effect on behavior. As for the first measure, interpersonal distance, I found myself keeping away from other players, especially males, because I knew that my avatar was unattractive. My unattractive avatar also decreased self-disclosure, preventing me from becoming intimate. The most I shared was when another player asked where I was from. As for the third measure, height, although I was not in a situation in which I was negotiating with another user, the shortness of my avatar did impact my overall confidence. For example, after the other players moved away, I assumed that it was because of me and was not willing to approach other players.

One significance difference between my experience and Yee & Bailenson’s study is the crucial role of behavioral confirmation (expectations of the perceiver cause the target to behave in ways that confirm the perceiver’s expectations). My self-perception caused me behave differently but because others also expected me and therefore treated me as an unattractive virtual being, I kept my distance even more and was even more unwilling to self-disclose. With both the Proteus Effect and behavior confirmation playing a role, I found m experience as a rodent in Second Life lonely and difficult.

Comment 1
Comm 245 Blue: 10. EarlMonroe in Second Life

Comment 2
Comm 245 Blue: #10: Too Fat for Friends

Assignment 10: Call of Duty 4

For this post, I decided to use the game Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, a recently released first person shooter for various gaming systems (I played it on Windows.) The premise of the game is “realistic” modern combat, played out in a tense single player campaign or in a multiplayer environment. The game’s multiplayer aspect had several types of game play. For this post, I chose to experiment with three of them: Sabotage, Domination, and Team Death Match. One drawback of the game with respect to the post was that avatars were not individually chosen; a player chooses a side and a weapons kit, and assigned a player model based on the two choices. This lead me to wonder if the selection of side would affect the ability of the team to function. Would a player’s self perception of their avatar (either a United States Marine/British SAS agent or non-descript Middle Eastern Soldier/Russian Spetsnaz operative) prime them to behave in a certain way? The US/UK soldiers appeared better equipped and perhaps a little more professional than the model for the other two factions.

My first game was with the Sabotage game type. In this game, each team attempts to carry a bomb to the other team’s weapons cache, and defend the device until it detonates. I chose this mode because it requires teamwork to accomplish the goal. I first noticed that there was a heavy number imbalance in players, favoring the US side. This is not uncommon to see in online games, especially when playing on servers based in the US. For this game, the “Op For” (as they’re called in the game, probably to not offend any single country; instead opting to slightly agitate them all at once) team lacked teamwork to overcome the enemy. We were almost immediately surrounded and picked off, giving the other team complete control over our cache.

The second game used the Domination rule set. In this style, there are three flags placed around the map. A team accumulates points based on how many flags they are holding at any given moment. They also serve as spawn points for the team’s players. I played on the Russian Spetsnaz side, facing the British SAS. The sides seemed evenly matched, and both sides used a fair amount of team work. Once again my team lost, but it was by no means a lost cause for the Russians. This game seemed to contradict the first in terms of whether team selection affected teamwork.

The third game involved the much faster paced Team Death Match. Once again I was put on the “Op For” side due to a numbers imbalance, but it was not nearly as bad as the first game. One thing I noticed while player was although the combat was extremely chaotic, whenever I checked the UAV screen (essentially a screen that shows you where all players are) clear territories were present at all times. There was a definite “front line” apparent whenever I checked the screen, around every 10 seconds during the match. The territories shifted quickly, but any soldier that got too far into enemy territory was quickly shot down and forced to re-spawn on his side. No apparent difference in teamwork between the two sides was revealed by this match.

In retrospect, three games was not nearly enough experience to be able to make a judgment on whether team selection affected a player’s self-perception of their avatar, and thus of themselves in game. In Yee/Baileson’s 2007 study, they found that height and attractiveness of an online avatar increased that player’s aggressiveness and level of self-disclosure/comfort with strangers, respectively. This effect, known as the Proteus Effect, was not apparent in my limited experience with this game. The inability to change one’s individual avatar probably had an effect on the apparent lack of effect. All models were relatively of the same height, and of the same general facial features and shapes. Instead what seemed to predict dominance was weapon choice and numerical superiority/inferiority. When a team I played on was badly outnumbered, they tended to withdraw and allow the other team to dictate the areas of conflict on the map. When people chose weapons with shorter range, they showed much more aggressiveness in getting closer to an enemy soldier than one who chose a longer range weapon. Both of these observations most likely had more to do with game mechanics than the Proteus Effect or behavioral confirmation.

10. EarlMonroe in Second Life

I entered the online-space of Second Life, for the first time. Recalling Dwight Schrute’s decision, to make his Second Life character an exact replica of himself down to his job as a paper salesman (in the TV show, “The Office”), I decided to go in a different direction, and make my character look nothing like myself in real life. I thought this would make my Second Life experience feel more like an actual second life, but at first I felt more confused than anything else.

Second Life is a world online between gamers who create and interact with each other using self-created avatars. This online game sparks interesting social behavior online, and is becoming an interesting area of topic in the social psychology of the internet.

As for being confused, at first when signing up I had my first name starting with a lowercase letter, until a message popped up asking me if I was sure I wanted to do that. This made me step back and realize I should be careful about my name choice, as it would be another aspect of my online persona to be judged upon. I went with EarlMonroe and built off the boy-next door avatar. I figured some people would recognize me as a basketball fan because my name was intended to identify me as a fan of Earl “The Pearl” Monroe, however nobody made any such comments. So, it was a seemingly convincing that EarlMonroe was my real name.

Next, I felt I needed to explore a Second Life dance-party that people have been telling about in real-life. I ended up in one long conversation with a female avatar that approached me. When the character approached me, I did feel satisfied that I created a character someone wanted to approach, and I became so engaged in the conversation that I did not really think about starting conversations with any other gamers.

With regard to Yee and Bailenson’s (2007) paper, I did notice some aspects of the “Proteus Effect”, even after about a 30 minute conversation with one other character. The Proteus Effect applies to the online-world because it suggests that the strongest indicator of how people will act in the online-world is the avatar that that person creates for him or herself. My character was tall, distinct, and good-looking. I almost immediately revealed to my counterpart that I was new to the game. My decision to reveal I was new to the game is consistent with Yee and Bailenson’s assessment that attractive players would be more likely to disclose personal information. In this regard, I agreed with the paper.

However, I am unsure about the paper’s statement that tall players are more confident, as the female character I conversed with was short, but very confident. She was confident enough to approach a male character, when it appeared the dance-party consisted mostly of men seeking out females. My character was tall, but I am not sure I felt more confident because of my height. My character was tall, distinct, and good-looking, but these attributes only contributed to my self-confidence one the female took notice of them. I took the invitation to a conversation to be an assessment of my avatar’s likeable and attractive appearance. I was not sure I had the confidence to approach other’s until after this first conversation in which the female approached my character.


Essentially my study mirrored similar results to Yee and Bailenson’s with regard to the Proteus Effect. I am unsure that being tall made me act more dominant, but I was tall and I ended up being confident. My avatar was attractive, according to at least one outside source, and I do think this helped me self-disclose more, because I was under the impression someone was interested in what I had to say and was looking simply for conversation. This is consistent with SIP that would say over-time people can get to know each other quite well in cmc interactions. Further, my personality online was not necessarily how I act in real-life, but I did not intend for my avatar to be an exact replica of myself in the first place. My actions online however did appear to be a result of some of the characteristics and “skins” I chose to assume in my avatar. Lastly, a limitation of my study is that I only spent one hour on the Second Life in which I was engaged in only one conversation that lasted for more than 20 minutes. Nonetheless, I feel Yee and Bailenson’s study, especially when looked at with ideas such as Problematic Internet Use in mind, is very applicable to online-worlds such as Second Life.

Comments:
Comm 245 Blue: Assignment 10: Feared and Revered
Comm 245 Blue: Shawty is a 10

10 Confidence on Second Life

I chose to play in the virtual world Second Life for this assignment. Second Life is a 3D virtual environment where players can interact, socialize, and participate in group activities. When I registered for an account, I was asked to pick a name and avatar to represent myself in the metaverse. I selected the male “nightclub” avatar. Once in-game I proceeded to fine-tune my appearance such that I appeared taller and huskier, with black hair and clothes. (Second Life has HUGE set of options for configuring your character’s appearance down to the finest detail, by the way. This is the greatest level of avatar configurability I’ve ever seen.) I was going for a confident, “don’t-mess-with-me” type of look – perhaps to the point of being intimidating. Never mind that in real life I look nothing like this (well, except for the black hair).

It was fairly easy for me to socialize with various people in the vicinity, and I would say at least part of this ease can be attributed to the outward appearance of my character. Being a “nightclub” guy meant it wouldn’t look at all unusual if I were a total chatterbox looking for someone to talk to. This observation agrees with the findings by Yee & Bailenson. Specifically, I have exhibited the Proteus effect – behaving in a manner which reinforces how I appear to others. However, many times I initiated conversation by asking newbie questions about the game (how to pick up a torch, where can I find this in my inventory, how I can I find events, etc). This basically meant that I was on the receiving end of a lot of help and information. Consequently I was not in a position to exhibit any sort of overly confident behavior that my avatar’s appearance would suggest. This aspect of my behavior contrasts with the theory set forth by Yee & Bailenson. The Proteus effect considers only your digital self-representation, not how others perceive you based on that representation. Based on that hypothesis, I should behave confidently no matter what I am doing. However, in this case situational forces have taken precedence in my online self-presentation.

My avatar was fairly attractive looking, which leads to two predictions about my behavior from the Yee & Baileson paper. First, I would be more likely to walk closer to individuals I socialized with (close interpersonal distance). This was definitely true; I often went right in front of people when I was talking to them. It was not a distance that would be socially comfortable in real life. Second, the paper predicted I would have exhibited higher self-discloser. This was not actually the case for me because I specifically intended on remaining anonymous. Thus I was keen on keeping discussion to various aspects of the game and random small talk. Lastly, the height of my avatar would lead Yee and Baileson to predict that I would behave in a more confident manner. As described above, situational forces precluded this behavior from occurring.

Comment 1
Comment 2

10: The Proteus Effect: A Bunch of Baloney??

EverQuest - a game of adventure, of excitement, of challenge, of fighting, of victory, of passion, and for some, even of love. To the strong few, EverQuest is not a game, but is a way of life. Thus I thought that creating the avatar "Sumiya", a female Siberian Tiger (like the one so cherished by Sigfried and Roy above) in humanoid form (a tiger with Gisele Bündchen's body), would allow me to have some pretty fierce girlpower on the MMORPG. After playing for an entire hour, however, I found that this was not to be so for a n00b such as I. I was so bogged down by the intricacies and manuverings of the game as a first-time player, that I found little time to unleash the Catwoman that was clawing inside of me.

Yee & Bailenson (2007) describe the Proteus Effect as an individual’s behavior conforming
to their digital self-representation independent of how others perceive them. An avatar that one creates in an online environment composes our entire self-representation in that setting. Users of an MMORPG like EverQuest conform to the behavior that they believe others would expect their avatar to have. For instance, one would expect a barbarian avatar to be rough and tough, thus the person who has selected the character may act in that manner on the game. The Proteus Effect may seem similar to SIDE, however there is a fundamental difference between the two theories. SIDE predicts that one will act according to group influences, i.e. if you are a wood elf in a guild with other wood elves on EverQuest, you would probably act wise and knowledgable to fit in with your fellow creatures. However, the Proteus Effect predicts that you will act like a wood elf because of your individual identity/chosen avatar, not because of influence from other characters. You'll be pretty slick whether or not your other elf friends are there to help you grow in your mannerisms.

Like any MMORPG, you get the most out of them if you play them at length (how this affects your real life is another story). I felt I was truly held back from experiencing the Proteus Effect because of the many intricacies of the game. In the first hour, my interaction was mostly with NPCs (non-player characters), computerized characters whose duty it was to teach me how to get around the land of Norrath. Sumiya, my avatar, broke out of jail with the help of a NPC barbarian, had her axe fixed by a NPC wood elf, and received armor from a NPC dark elf. There were other "n00bs" in the land of Norrath, but they were scuttering around trying to complete these same tasks in order to gain the ability to do more things in the game. I attempted to commnicate once or twice with a male human avatar to see if Sumiya's feline ferociousness would come out in conversation, or even battle, however I was met with a blank stare. My experience playing EverQuest was slower and not as rich as the time I played WOW for an earlier assignment. Ultimately, Sumiya got lost in a field of spiders trying to collect silk for a dark elf, and found herself stuck in a giant spiderweb, unable to move. My cries of help in the main chat were to no avail, and I ended the game.

Had I not gotten caught in a large 2-D spiderweb, and had I played the game for several more hours, I'm sure my dialogue as a crazy cat would have shown through to my fellow players. This animal avatar had strength points that were quite high (although wisdom points which were quite low), so my winning battles via brute strength I'm sure would have gone to my head. I can imagine a time when my actions did meld with the those expected of a particular avatar. In an earlier assignment, I created a human avatar while playing WOW, and in an attempt to explore communication in this online forum, I played the hapless female who knew nothing about the game, inquring many male avatars about how to progress to the next level. My attempt to exert my femaleness in order to foster communication agreed with the woman avatar that I chose.

I came, I saw, I commented
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-too-fat-for-friends.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-my-second-life-died.html

10: Are you trying to have sex with me?!

Yes. Someone ACTUALLY asked me that.

As I entered the "Skin, Clothes, and Appearance" room in Second Life, I began to notice lots of naked people surrounding my avatar, Riley Kazyanenko. While I started to feel a little uncomfortable, I slowly realized that I had teleported to the room in which people not only change their appearances but also go to have a little exotic fun. Once I knew what was going on and had played around with my surroundings for a little while, I felt comfortable approaching people. The first avatar that I approached was a man. We started to chat, going over some small talk regarding how we were doing and how long we have been familiar with Second Life. This male character started asking me questions and one of them was about "where he could get some skin?" Of course, I at once thought that he was looking for someone to have cyber-sex with, and so I responded as if I was offended that he would ask such a question. However, I quickly learned that he simply wanted to take off his shirt in order to get a tan, so he wanted to be directed to where he could take his shirt off. Now, this seems innocent enough, but when I told him how to alter his appearance, I was met with the response, "are you trying to have sex with me?". I was shocked! All I did was answer his question! So I said no, and sort of yelled at his avatar for assuming that I was asking for sex.

This is the moment when I realized how different my avatar was from my actual self. One look at my avatar and I can understand why he wondered about my motives. Dressed in acid-washed skin tight jeans with the crack of my behind sticking out for the world to see and a belly shirt accentuating my cleavage, Riley Kazyanenko looked like she just stepped out of a dance club. And this man's inquiry did not make her stop! Soon, we teleported to the Dance Life Suite and met lots of avatars that enjoyed dancing just as much as Riley did. She was not afraid to get out on the dancefloor and go after anyone within twenty feet of her. In this sense, it is clear that the Proteus Effect took place because while I love to dance, Riley was accentuating her attractiveness to the fullest degree! Although I chose my avatar, I picked her features quite randomly, and Riley ended up using her attractiveness to get closer with strange men throughout the entire simulation. Regardless of whether or not Riley sought out the attention of men, her mere appearance made her seem "available" and "approachable" to men. As a result, Riley became a more confident avatar and by the end of our simulation, she was approaching strangers with the assumption that they would automatically be attracted to her sexually enticing character. Behavioral confirmation plays a large role here as Yee and Bailenson describe because other avatar's perceptions of Riley made her in fact behave in those preconceived ways, thus confirming the perceiver's expectations.

In terms of how my avatar affected how I behaved online, I do not believe that Riley's behavior was in any way an expression of my own personality. I was completely aware of what Riley was doing the entire time during the simulation, and I simply reacted to how others perceived her. My control over Riley definitely exhibited the fact that I was having fun with Second Life, a tool that I have never used before and was extremely intrigued by. Its complexities were incredible, and I was simply having a good time taking it all in. With that said, I do understand how the Proteus Effect takes place because I did feel Being a first time user of Second Life, whom will probably never use it again, I was in complete control over what my avatar did, sometimes purposely making her seem more promiscuous because of her appearance. My only problem with the simulation that I performed is that I cannot determine whether I made Riley act in a more sexually explicit way because of the way she looked or whether I unknowningly developed my avatar in a way that was created by how the other avatars perceived her.


http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/assignment-10-not-my-second-life.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/shawty-is-10.html

Shawty is a 10

The Game Plan: For this assignment, I thought it would be interesting to test drive the graphical game world of "Second Life". Through performing a Google search, I came across the link for "Second Life". To be honest, what drew me in was the slogan "Your world. Your Imagination". In addition, I stumbled upon several YouTube clips and blog posts about this graphical gaming world. Needless to say, I was curious to understand what the fuss was all about.

The Game: Upon entering the virtual "welcome" portion, I was surprised at how similar the graphics were to "The Sims". Although I was not a big "Sims" player, I noticed that the overall design of the avatar was fairly the same. However, what threw me off the most was trying to navigate through this virtual world. I found myself bumping into the mountain and stumbling into other players as I tried to get acquainted with my surroundings. Interestingly enough, I stumbled into another player, who was a little more experienced with using the application. "She" came up to me and greeted me almost instantly. I told "her" that I was new to the whole "Second Life" scene, and I was trying to get familiar with all of the options. "She" politely informed me that I could change the appearance of my avatar by right-clicking. However, my computer and "Second Life" did not seem to get along very well. As I played around with all of the features, my computer would freeze every now and again. Thus, it made exploring the virtual world rather difficult.

The virtual environment was not as impressive as that of "The Sims", but it was creative if anything else. The volcanoes, buildings, and sea added something novel. The scary part though were the flying people everywhere, and the large stiletto heels that almost trampled me on several occasions. I clearly wasn't in the land of the Sims. This is where the tutorials came in handy. As I walked around, I came across tutorials outlining how to do everything from change my appearance to travel through the different lands. I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to change my appearance. It was interesting to see how many different aspects of my appearance I could tinker with. At first, I wanted to make my avatar resemble myself, but that proved to be problematic because I needed to completely revamp what everything. Thus, instead, I just opted to make the avatar as cute and stylish as possible. I asked the "girl" where "she" found "her" cute rugby styled shirt, and "she" proceeded to walk away. It's weird because initially I thought it was really cool of "her" to help me out. However, when "she" walked away, I immediately wrote her off as being "bitchy", even though she didn't give me much reason to think that.
After finalizing a look that I thought was acceptable, I ventured into the realm of "Help Islands". I was overwhelmed by the "real-world" simulation of purchasing things like different modes of transportation and clothing. My favorite part had to be talking with the different avatars around. I found that the male avatars gave off a subtle flirtatious vibe; while the female avatars were similarly interested in talking about their experience with "playing" the game thus far. Almost instantly, I began to draw personality conclusions about the individuals I was talking to based on how they chose to present their avatars and their conversation style.

The Research: After reading the article by Yee and Bailenson, it is readily apparent how my choice of avatar influenced my behavior within the virtual gaming environment. Upon changing the appearance of my avatar, Jade Tuqiri, I was trying to make her "cute". Honestly, in my mind I was trying to go for a Laguna Beach/Newport Harbor look. I made her medium height, skinny, blonde. I also tried to find stylish outfits for her. With respect to my gaming behavior, Yee and Bailenson's notion of the "Proteus Effect" come to mind. In essence, my online gaming behavior was informed by my perception of what those I would interact with would expect. I was very friendly and flirtatious in my interactions with other players in the game. I also modeled my communication style based on who I was speaking with. Thus, with female avatars I was less flirty and more friendly. However, with the male avatars, I asked a lot of probing questions and self-disclosed more.
Extending my analysis, I found that not only did my behavior support Yee and Bailenson's claims, but also that of the other "Second Life" players. Typically, other deemed "attractive" avatars were increasingly more social with other players. They were more likely to simulate conversation, while the less "attractive" avatars interacted more with the actual "gaming" aspect. In addition, I noticed that when I self-disclosed information, the individuals who were most likely to reciprocate were other "attractive" avatars. The less "attractive" avatars were more interested in talking about "Second Life". With respect to the "taller" avatars, I kind of found them to be rather threatening. I was not really too happy with their ability to tower over me, but that did not really discourage me from initiating conversation. I felt that mostly the height was a method of overcompensation and the person on the other side of the computer screen was probably was 5 foot.

Assignment 10: Adventures in my Second Life

For this assignment I decided to try out the graphical game, Second Life. We have spoken about it so much in class that I figured I should find out what all the hype is about. After about 3 hours of computer problems and download malfunctions, I finally got the game to work. Upon entering the virtual world, I was immediately surprised with how advanced it was. Although it did not look like reality, the environment was still impressive. There were volcanoes, buildings, an ocean, and (as I was definitely surprised to see) flying people all over the place. I proceeded through many of the tutorials, learning how to communicate with others, move about the lands, and change my appearance. This last one proved to be the most intensive for me. I spent almost 20 minutes changing my appearance in order to make the most attractive avatar I could. I was so enthralled, in fact, that I didn’t even notice when another user was asking me a question over and over. When I finally snapped out of my trance, I caught the phrase, “He probably isn’t paying attention because he has spent the last ten minutes changing his appearance”. Needless to say, even though it is a virtual world and I was anonymous, I was still embarrassed.
After making my way through the tutorials and into the “Help Islands”, I was able to purchase different clothes, try out different modes of transportation, and talk to more people. In one location I was asked by a female avatar if I was one of the guides in the game. I told her that I wasn’t and that I was new to the game. She told me that she was too and we spoke about the experience together for a few minutes. I found it very interesting that the other users and I were so comfortable talking to one another even though we didn’t know each other.
After reading Yee and Bailenson, I can definitely see how my choice of avatar affected how I behaved in the game. When I edited the appearance of my avatar, Logan Knoller, I attempted to make him as “good looking” as possible. I made him tall, muscular, and with pleasing facial features. My behavior would accurately be described by the Proteus Effect, in that I found that I conformed to the behavior that I believed others would expect me to have (Yee and Bailenson, 4). I was more confident and suave in the game, initiating conversations with people I didn’t know and taking a more certain tone.
Additionally the other users and my behavior proved to support Yee and Bailenson’s hypotheses. I found that other attractive avatars and I came in much closer contact with those who we were addressing, almost up in the other person’s face, while the less attractive avatars tended to stay further away. Additionally, I noticed that not only myself, but the other attractive avatars, were also much more likely to self disclose more information. For example, the avatar who addressed me to ask if I was a guide and who later became involved in a detailed conversation with me was attractive (in the game of course). Finally, although I did not enter into any negotiations, I did find that I felt more in control and confident with my taller avatar. A couple times during my game play experience a shorter avatar came into contact with me and I found myself looking down on them (both physically and figuratively). Overall, my experience was in line with Yee and Bailenson’s hypotheses and the Proteus Effect.

I commented on:
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-are-you-trying-to-have-sex-with-me.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-too-fat-for-friends.html

Second Life For The First Time

For somebody who has never played any kind of online game I certainly struggled getting the appearance that I was striving for in the game called Second Life. The avatar that I created did not exactly resemble the person that I wanted to. I was extremely tall and awkward looking. I found that people seemed either intimidated by my appearance or at least caught off guard by my extremely long limbs. I found it rather difficult to interact with people in the game. However, when I was able to strike up a conversation with another avatar I found that they had some very witty comments about my look. I felt like I was in a school yard being bullied by the cool kids. I was tall and thought that I was going to be able to intimidate people but instead of doing that I found myself being avoided or made fun of like I was an actual person.
After some time I found myself trying to keep quiet and avoid conversation. This way I could just observe others interactions. By acting sheltered or shy I found myself conforming to what Yee & Bailenson call the Proteus effect. This is when one conforms to the stereotypes of their avatar’s appearance in an online environment. I found myself acting exactly how others thought I should act. I was lanky and awkward and it did not take long for me to start acting in this manner. I am not a shy person at all yet I was acting how I thought my avatar should act. I felt self-conscious and uncomfortable. I tried my best to find others who looked lost or maybe even someone from the class who had never done this before. Fortunately I found an awkwardly uncoordinated and tall female. She looked like she could have been my avatar sister. I began chatting with her and felt much more comfortable because she did not seem to have the same stereotypes that everyone else had about me in my previous encounters. The more we talked the more comfortable I felt. This is proof of the Proetus effect and how we act as others see us.

10: Second, Third, and Fourth Life

This was my second time entering the realm of Second Life for the purposes of a Comm 245 blog. Thankfully, I haven't developed PIU and I only log in to do research.

Already having dealt with the trauma that is the tutorial, I quickly moved to an open field with some people milling about talking mostly about sex, not surprisingly. I remember from articles I've read most of the people on Second LIfe (hereafter to be referred to as SL) are sexual outcasts or researchers studying sexual outcasts. I was still wearing my half woman / half fox outfit from my last experimental outing and was already getting invitations to yiff . Already out of my comfort zone I changed my avatar back into a girl-next-door attitude. I had already learned from last time that as a male I wasn't going to be approached by many. Some relatively normal looking people began to talk to me asking some basic questions about what my interests were. I chatted back, and the discourse slowly moved to flirty. I was reminded of the chat room experience I had earlier this semester. The difference this time around was I got to watch myself flirt back as a female. This really helped me act/speak more effeminately and really work the girl-next-door role. This is a textbook example of Yee and Bailson's Proteus Effect. This effect is when a person is when a person acts in line with the expectations of their character. Because I looked like an outgoing, attractive female, it was much easier to pretend to be one than when I was in a strictly chat based environment.

I than decided to experiment. I changed my avatar to a taller, more muscular woman. Yee would predict that the people I were interacting with would be more likely to take a subservient role, compared to my leader-ish character. Unfortunately, conversation came to a brief halt after my make-over. The men and women with whom I'd been chatting almost immediately seemed disinterested in me. This came as a shock to me. In a space like SL, where your appearance is a conventional signal (low cost, easy to change) you would think that it holds less weight, because anyone can change their appearance quickly, drastically, and easily. To my surprise, in this space where appearance is so wishy-washy, it means a great deal. So this matched the findings of Yee, as in their study less attractive avatars were treated with less friendliness.

I than played the other card, a skinny, but busy woman wearing rather revealing clothes. Now on my fourth life, I was ready for some really friendly interactions. And boy did people come through. All sorts of players took a vested interest in me. In fact, many went as far as to give me outfits to try on. Now, I'm not totally familiar with the economics of linden dollars, but apparently these items have monetary value. Just based on my appearance, people were willing to give me items of value, just so they could see me try them on. Each gift I received was more objectifying and sexual than the one before it, and even as a guy was pretty disgusted with peoples overt sexual motives. Frighteningly enough, however, I played along. In retrospect, I feel like a total creeper. Either way, because of my sexual appearance, I was much more comfortable acting like a sexual object. My own, uncharacteristic actions convinced me that the Proteus effect is quite real.

I commented at:
Hayleigh Hotshot Meets Second-Life
and
Pro-team-fortress-eus-effect

#10: Shorties on Second Life

For this week’s assignment, I decided to enter the world of Second Life. Second Life is a multi-player virtual game dedicated to interacting with other players’ avatars. When asked to create an avatar, I decided to “express” myself by designing a character that looked like me. My avatar’s name is Sharon Gibson. She is 5’1 and has green eyes and brown hair.

As I entered the gamespace, I noticed a few details. First, the graphics of the game were much lower quality than I expect them to be. Being such a popular game, I was anticipating much more detailed environments and landscapes. Further, I also noticed that some players were very willing to converse, while others were not. I also found it a bit hard to navigate as I was only allowed to use the four arrows and my actions were delayed. In addition, I spent most of my time in the introductory stage of the game and didn’t get a chance to experience the space more in depth. As I gained all the necessary basic experience, I was finally able to leave “Orientation Island” and enter the game. Here people were much more willing to interact and communicate with others. I could chat with characters, overhear conversations and had much more freedom in my movements, gestures and options.

Overall I had a good experience playing the game. I had the opportunity to converse with several avatars. In the process I became “friends” with Kimberly McDonnell. She had entered Second Life about two days ago and was still in the process of exploring. She was very willing to show me around and invited me to follow her as she introduced me to other people she had already met. I also noticed that avatars are required to remain in their persona, as acting out of character was strongly discouraged.

Yee and Bailenson’s study focuses on three fundamental hypothesis of online interaction, especially related to the creation of online characters. To test their theories I tried to communicate with either very attractive or very unattractive looking avatars. Their first hypothesis states that participants in the attractive condition walk closer to the confederate than the participant in the unattractive condition. Although I didn’t think my avatar was the most attractive one in the gamespace, she was overall good-looking. During my interactions, I walked close to the people I was speaking with and they didn’t seem to back away. I did notice though, that two types of avatars were being clearly avoided by everyone else. These were the ones who were missing articles of clothing (likely to be a new and inexperienced member) and ones that were not very attractive. I also tried walking closer to some of less attractive individuals but they seemed to back away.

Their second hypothesis stated that participants in the more attractive condition would exhibit higher self-disclosure and present more pieces of information about themselves than participants in the unattractive conditions.. Again, this hypothesis proved to be correct. During my interactions, I regarded myself to be good-looking and entertained long conversations about my interests and my hobbies (self-disclosure). I generally found that as opposed to less attractive characters, the more attractive ones were more likely to disclose more about their personality and have a better sense of humor.

Finally, the third hypothesis states that “participants in taller avatars would behave in more confident manner and negotiate more aggressively than participants in shorter avatars.” This hypothesis was not supported by my findings. My avatar was short (5’1) and I did not have any trouble interacting with others, negotiating or communicating.

In my case, I think my findings support the Proteus Effect. This effect explains that people tend to “…conform to the behavior that they believe others would expect them to have.” In my case, the looks of my avatar changed the way I behaved. During the first twenty minutes of the game, while I didn’t have any hair, I avoided contact with people and others avoided communicating with me. Once I gained my hair back, my avatar looked more like the real me and thus it reflected my more confident personality. During this time, I was open to meeting new people (H1: walking close by, H2: high self-disclosure) and being 5’1 did not put me at any disadvantage (H3). Overall, the appearance of my avatar did change my behavior.




COMMENTS:
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/assignment-10-call-of-duty-4.html#links

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/11/if-your-avatar-isnt-hot-you-wont-get.html

The avatar is the 'You are here' dot of the virtual world.

World of Warcraft seems to be the 800lb gorilla in the Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) scene today. It almost seems that everyone and their dog play the game. I have been playing the game very casually (sometimes I question and not spend the monthly fee for how little I play) since the launch in November 2004 and have seen the game grow from large to almost epic proportions.

I primarily play a male Night Elf druid, but I have alternate characters of almost all other races and both genders, although none of them are particularly high level. In the game, users are allowed to modify certain characteristics such as hair, face, skin tone, and accessories (earrings/tattoos); however, height and weight are set by the game according to race. Night elves are one of the taller races in the game. The druid class is a hybrid class meaning that it can fulfill several separate group rolls effectively and is desirable in a group, but possibly the least played class in the game. For the purposes of the assignment, I’ll use my experience with my main character and compare and contrast it with my experience playing alternate characters.

Yee and Bailenson would argue that while playing my druid (who is tall) for example, I would act more confidently and negotiate aggressively in comparison to my Dwarf hunter or Orc warrior. This is the Proteus effect, which, is argued, drives people to act in a manner appropriate of their avatar. In my highly unscientific observation, I didn’t perceive much of a difference in my actions between my multiple characters whether based on height (as in my example), gender, or class. While this seems to go counter to the theory proposed by Yee and Bailenson, it does not necessarily discount the theory.

I mention this because I feel that the scope and effectiveness of the Proteus effect lies in how much people empathize with their avatar. My personal experience with the game is much more objective focused. The game, to me, is just that, a game. The way I act in the game is completely based on making the game enjoyable. Thus, I am usually polite, social, and patient with people regardless of my avatar or theirs as creating problems usual ruins the gaming experience. In addition, I primarily play with real life friends; people who have met me and know who I am outside of the game. I believe that this results in a more homogenized act between characters as my friends will recognize all my characters as “Joe” not the character and thus there is no point in acting outside of myself. I’m more interested in the game play than the social avatar aspect of the game. When I play a Human mage, I act the same as when I play a Troll mage, or even my main Night Elf druid.

In my opinion, the avatar simply represents my location in the game world, but that’s just me and I play the game to simply play the game and have fun with already established friends.

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If your avatar isn't hot, you won't get a lot

Upon first entering Second Life, I thought I was in for an easy ride; little did I know that Second Life is not intended to be a piece of cake for the novice videogame player. I actually had a lot of trouble finding my way off of Orientation Island, even with the instructions provided in the corner of the screen. Some of my orientation tasks included communicating with the other players, grasping an object from my inventory, and using a map to explore my location. While already perplexed by trying to complete the tasks required to earn passage from the Island to the outside world, I was bombarded with messages from my fellow players. They were, at first, distracting, though I was eventually able to figure out how to interact with the other players to ask for help. The Second Life Mentor, Kandi Carnell, was particularly helpful – she even instant messaged me and called me ‘darling’! I was happily surprised by the helpfulness of many of my peers – I guess I appeared to be lost, and they were consequently very receptive to me. Maybe this is because I chose the cute “Girl Next Door” avatar character? Or because my name was Kramer Moomintoog (for the simple reason that I found the word ‘Moomintoog’ to be highly entertaining)? Whatever their motives, the other avatars were unexpectedly friendly and happy to help.

I teleported to Help Island after failing to attain my last piece of the Orientation Island “puzzle of passage.” My mentor Kandi informed me that it didn’t really matter, so I decided to move on as I had been stuck in a beginner’s rut for awhile at this point. On Help Island, I browsed the Freebie Store for clothing and accessories, and may have even accidentally picked up a painting – I really can’t be sure. I learned that “Linden dollars” are the units of currency in Second Life and that they can be purchased with real money. Though I myself didn’t find the investment worth it, I wondered if this was any significant source of revenue for the program.

Considering Yee’s discussion of the appearance of Avatars affecting users’ behaviors, I believe that in my case, it did. The first and second hypotheses in particular (walking closer to conversation partners when one is more attractive and exhibiting higher self-disclosure when one is more attractive) were applicable. After being approached by several of my fellow avatars, I realized that, in Second Life land, I was considered pretty hot. As I had no clue how to alter the default “Girl Next Door” avatar, I kept her exactly as she was and no one seemed to mind. Behavioral confirmation was definitely at work in that I was more confident in messaging and approaching the others for help after realizing that they would be receptive because I had selected a hottie of an avatar. In Yee’s own words, “the avatar is not simply a uniform that is worn, the avatar is our entire self-representation.” I tried to live up to the good qualities others may have assumed of me (being an attractive avatar), and consequently tried to represent myself positively. The Proteus Effect provides a good explanation of this phenomenon. These events illustrated the propensity of avatars to conform to individual identity cues – in other words, I wanted to act more friendly because I took on a more attractive character. In addition, online deindividuation effects contributed to my experience. Combined with the fact that the avatar is the primary identity cue by which players judge one another, I acted in whatever way I pleased as I was virtually anonymous apart from my avatar identity – with others basing their opinions solely on Kramer Moomintoog, no one would ever know the “real me” if I didn’t want them to.

While Second Life definitely has the potential to be an interesting escape from reality, it requires both time and practice. I look forward to hanging out with some of my new avatar friends, and hopefully escaping Orientation Island, the next time I’m in need of some quality procrastination.

Assignment 10

Before this assignment, I had never played an online game. So I saw this blog post as a good opportunity to find out what all the hype is all about. The plots of some recent episodes of a couple of the television shows I watch have been centered around online games.

I visited the website for Second Life, and saw that they state on their homepage, "Second Life is a 3D online digital world imagined and created by its residents." I decided to delve further. I signed up for a free account, chose a name and location, and selected an avatar.

One of the first things I noticed were the graphics. They were not very good. We hear in the media about all the improved game graphics, but I did not see anything that really impressed me.

I also noticed the avatar physical characteristics. Many of the choices were very unrealistic. I understand, however, that this is part of the appeal of the public to this game. According to Yee and Bailenson, "attractive individuals tend to be more extroverted and more friendly." They also mention that a player's other online characteristic change based on their choice of avatar and the avatar's physical characteristics. When I played, I did not notice much of a difference between my real life character and my in-game character. I can completely understand, however, that many people would act differently in-game than they do in reality. I, personally, had nothing to gain by changing my character when playing online.

Reality is reality, no matter what people argue. Until the online environment becomes reality, at the end of the day, all you have are hours spent online.


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#10: Too Fat for Friends

For this assignment I created an account and explored a whole new world in Second Life. Second Life is a multi-player virtual world in which users can explore, socialize and interact with each other through an avatar that can be customized and modified to one’s own liking. My experience in Second Life begun with me picking a username and a tutorial, in which I learned how to change my appearance, interact with others, utilize the map function and manage my objects. Since most others were figuring things out just as I was, I didn’t have many interactions with others. However, I did change my appearance in hopes of observing interesting reactions from others. I decided upon making “Haley Rieko” extremely unlucky in the gene department. She was much too overweight and short with distorted facial features in tow. Soon after editing my avatar, I was able to teleport from “Orientation Island” into a new exploratory welcome island where individuals were much more social and there were many interactions going on.

In this new environment many individuals were interacting with one another. I was in a small area with about twenty other avatars and there were multiple conversations I could “overhear” through the chat function. I attempted to approach a few different males by gesturing “Hey!” yet they ignored my attempted conversations. Therefore, I spent a great deal of time observing others interactions. At one point, there were two attractive, leggy females dancing with each other as others watched on. As soon as they ceased their seductive grinding, many attractive males approached them and began conversations in which they self-disclosed. “Haley Rieko”, on the other hand, had no such luck. The only individual I ended up conversing with was a frightening looking human who resembled a black cat. We briefly discussed the other interactions going on and our experiences with Second Life. For the most part I found myself afraid to approach others because I was unattractive and could not get a consistent response. Sadly, “Haley Rieko” kept mostly to herself and away from the more rowdy individuals in the “welcome island”.

My Second Life experience closely matched what Yee & Bailenson describe as the Proteus Effect. The Proteus Effect states that users in an online environment will conform to the stereotypes of their avatar’s appearance. After interacting in Second Life for an hour, it was blatantly obvious to me that one’s avatar is his or her “entire self representation” and had a significant impact on one’s behavior. Since “Haley” was significantly shorter, more unattractive and overweight than the social norm (others surrounding her), I subconsciously had her behave in a more insecure, shy manner. Other users kept their distance from me and engaged in less self-disclosure probably because they felt uncomfortable interacting with me. On the other hand, those individuals who were dancing provocatively in front of others were much more attractive, and therefore probably more confident with their actions.

Assignment 10: Second Life

Since this assignment was to be based on Yee & Bailenson’s theory, I thought what better way to judge this than to use the same source that they did for their research: Second Life. While on Second Life I joined onto the Ben and Jerry’s community – one could chose from several different communities which had different goals for each. From there I got to chose whom I wanted to be (create my avatar). I chose an attractive female character that had blonde hair, tall, and slim. It took me a little while to adjust to site and figure out how things worked.

Once I got a hang on things I went up to numerous people and talked to them – it seemed fairly natural. I also had a handful of people coming up to me and talking (primarily males). In real life I would not have gone up to that many people or just walk away from a person mid-conversation because the conversation was extremely dull. I feel being in CMC mode and being anonymous, not necessarily having the appearance that I had on there, was the main grounds for my behaviour; which goes against Yee and Bailenson’s theory about “Proteus Effect”. For instance I did not feel more confident or powerful because I was taller in this “world”. I knew no one would ever meet me or know who I was. I do not believe being this specific character made me act in a specific way – although I can see how if I wanted to I could have easily goofed around and picked a silly character (like the animals) and could have portrayed myself in whichever way I wanted to just for the sake of it, with ease. I also believe that if people wanted to I could see how these online people could to lead to PIU where a person could become infatuated with Second Life and it consumes their life and they feel more comfortable within it than in person. This space most definitely allows people to change their character with ease and comfort since the space is in CMC, which goes along with Yee and Bailenson’s theory.

Although, I did not have any changes in my personality based on my avatar’s looks, rather it was due to being anonymous, I do believe more people spoke to me and approached me because of how my avatar looked in this space. If my avatar was not attractive, I would not have been approached at all, or seldomly. And people may not have responded to me with such patience while I was learning how to function in Second Life if my avatar was not attractive.

10 Proteus Effects on Mal’Ganis

The online environment I chose for Assignment 10 is the MMO World of Warcraft. I haven’t played since the expansion was released (it took me leaving the country, studying abroad, to quit the first time) but decided to reinstate my account and face PIU all over again for the sake of Assignment 10.

The Gamespace

World of Warcraft’s gamespace consists of a world called Azeroth that is divided into many different areas. There are two factions, the Horde and the Alliance which are in constant competition within Azeroth and have their own agendas and cities. Some of the areas are Alliance owned and some are Horde owned with everything else considered contested territory. The server in which I play is a PVP (player versus player) server which means that players of competing factions can “kill” each other whenever and wherever. A design such as this promotes a salient group (Horde vs Alliance) identity and behavior. This is an example of the SIDE theory in that the group identity is salient and members are visually anonymous thus promoting relationships on the basis of group membership including over-attributions based on social categories, conformity to norms, and social influences. My past experience playing in the space includes participating in pvp, raids, and quests. I have interacted with large groups of individuals and worked one on one with players assisting them in quests and instances.

My Avatar
















My avatar is on the server Mal’Ganis in the Horde faction and serves as the primary identity cue to other players in the game. She is a level 60 Troll Priest. It used to be very difficult to select a Horde character that was considered attractive (including the trolls) until the release of the expansion in which the blood elves were added to the Horde faction and are now by far the most attractive Horde race.


My One Hour Return to Face Addiction

During the hour that I played, I spent time in one of the major Horde cities called the Undercity. This is an advantageous place because it is located close to some lower level instances that are open to both Horde and Alliance players. I talked to some lower level players outside of Scarlet Monastery and intimidated some Alliance players that were in the area. My behavior exemplified The Proteus Effect which states that an individual’s behavior conforms to their digital self-representations independent of how others perceive them (Yee & Bailenson, 2007). I found myself hunting down the Alliance players even though I was alone, offering healing assistance to lower level Horde players, and not feeling intimidated by lower level Horde or Alliance players. This is directly related to my avatar’s class and level. I wouldn’t normally have a desire to pursue Alliance players while alone had I been in a contested area or in Alliance territory but because my avatar is Horde and I am in a Horde controlled area, I felt as if it was my responsibility as a Horde player to PVP Alliance members traveling through the area. Being a priest, I found myself seeking out opportunities to use my specific skills. I have the ability to do things other than heal but it is something that I enjoy doing and feel like it is my personal responsibility as a healing class. Probably the most salient aspect related to my time playing and The Proteus Effect is the fact that I was not intimidated by lower level Horde or Alliance players. Even though the individuals behind the avatars may have more experience than I do through playing other characters and may be better at strategically playing than myself, I did not consider this during my interactions. My avatar was a higher level and had better gear and thus I felt more confident in interacting with other players and, like Yee and Bailenson’s study (2007) found with height and confidence/aggressive negotiation, I felt I could be more aggressive in my negotiations with other players when they asked me for healing assistance in instances and quests.

My other comments:
Comm 245 Blue: 10: EverQuest
Comm 245 Blue: Second Life

Second Life

For Assignment #10, I decided to try out Second Life. This was my first experience playing in a multi-user world, and it was a bit difficult. I had to first create my avatar, and name her. This posed a couple of questions—did people generally use their real-world names? Or did they use names to protect their anonymity? I decided to go with the first option, and used my own name for my avatar. My anonymity was protected by the fact that I had to choose a last name from a list of preselected last names (which my real last name was not on). After choosing a name, I had to choose a look for my avatar. I had the choice of a few different characters, ranging from the “girl next door” look to some sort of animal-cartoon character. I chose the one I thought was most attractive out of all of the choices—the girl next door. Here is a picture of her compared with a few other Second Life characters.

(I am the girl with long brown hair wearing a purple shirt and jeans.) There was a very interesting interaction that occurred, and I believe the attractiveness of my avatar led to my actions. What happened was, as I was still learning how to walk/move fluently, I interrupted a conversation. An avatar named Carnel said to the rainbow-haired avatar, whose name is Racly,

[22:49] carnel Kanto: hi, Racly

[22:50] carnel Kanto: you are so beautiful!

I decided to jump in to the conversation, pretending Carnel was talking to my avatar, so I responded:

[22:51] You: thanks you're not so bad yourself!

[22:51] You: sorry I had to jump in

To which I had a positive response from Carnel:

[22:51] carnel Kanto: lol ;)

[23:00] carnel Kanto: hi, Vivian

[23:01] carnel Kanto: Here I am!

I think this interaction, after reading Yee & Bailenson (2007), confirms the first two hypotheses of the study—H1) participants in the attractive condition walk closer to the confederate than the participants in the unattractive condition, and H2) participants in the attractive condition would exhibit higher self-disclosure and present more pieces of information about themselves than participants in the unattractive condition. This interaction showed how because of my attractiveness, I was able to interrupt a conversation and not be reprimanded, as I would be in real life. I also wouldn’t want to interrupt a conversation in real life because I don’t think I would have the confidence to. One really has to have a lot of confidence to interrupt a conversation because it is seen as a rude and impolite gesture; I guess my attractiveness allowed me to get away with it in Second Life. I also did not hesitate to walk up to others, perhaps it’s because I was a little lost and confused, and wanted some help. I probably asked for more help than if I had been labeled an “unattractive” avatar; I definitely wasn’t afraid to talk to any of the other characters. This definitely supports hypothesis 1 and 2 because I had the confidence to walk up to people and get close, and I had the confidence to disclose information about myself (that I didn’t know how to play, that I was new, etc.). I wonder what it would be like if I chose the animal-looking avatar. Would I have had as much success with getting help, or talking to people?

One of the limitations of Yee & Bailenson (2007) study was that they “were unable to explore the role of choice in the Proteus Effect,” and while I did not experience those limitations, I did come across some other limitations. I was able to choose my avatar, I wasn’t just randomly assigned an attractive, average or unattractive avatar. While I was able to choose my avatar, I wasn’t able to personalize it—I had to select a premade avatar. This restricted my ability to express myself, but I guess that’s not as important for this study. From this experiment, I felt that my results demonstrated how the appearance of my avatar shaped how I interacted with others. I don’t know if my online self-representation will in turn shape my real-world behavior, but I guess only time will tell. How often I play Second Life also probably makes a differences of how it will shape my real-world behavior; I don’t know if I’ll be back anytime soon, though.