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.