Let it be stated I am not a fan of online video games. For whatever reason, the idea of playing a video game in front of a computer, no matter how cool an idea or game might be, has always seemed like a waste of time. I guess regular console games just seem more social to me, I don't know. Either way, for this assignment I decided to check out this Second Life world everyone speaks so highly of. Again, it seems like a really interesting and interactive idea, but an hour of this was quite painful.
I chose the boy next door avatar because I was in the mood to be wholesome. Also, I figured this would be a good way to test out the Proteus effect and see if I conformed to what I believe are the standards of the boy next door. Seeing as how I'd never played before, I needed to go through the orientation, and found it to be both informative and tedious. Once I got to the welcome area, that's where the interactions took off. In my first interactions I very politely asked some basic questions like how to change my appearance, etc, as well as try to find out some stuff about the other players. I don't know if it was because I was new to the game and felt it best to not step on any toes, or because I was conforming to my impression of the polite boy next door that I found myself being overly polite. I feel this was probably a result of the Proteus effect, and I felt the need to act like the polite boy next door.
I figured I would test out Yee's and Bailenson's ideas about people being friendlier to more attractive avatars. While I initially made myself a traditionally attractive boy next door, people were fairly nice and very helpful when I first jumped on. I thought they were just being nice and helpful to the new guy, and I also think this would only happen in a game like Second Life, which seems far less competitive than say World of Warcraft. In a more competitive atmosphere, I don't think the people would have been as hospitable. Anyway, after a few minutes of walking around polite and attractive, I decided to mix it up a bit and make myself unattractive. Seeing as how I was still a boy next door, I felt I should act as such and continue to be someone nice you can bring home to mom. Even though I was unattractive, the other characters continued to be nice and helpful and interactive. I conformed to the social cues of the boy next door, but others did not act more negatively towards me as my attraction level went down. I don't know if it was because an hour is not enough time to get the proper reaction, but either way their hospitality did not make the hour go by any easier. Let's just say I'm very grateful for my first life.
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Hi, Carlos, this was a very nice post. I found your observations on your increased politeness interesting because even though you were aware of the Proteus effect before you even logged on to Second Life, you still might have succumbed to it. I think at least part of your niceness can be attributed to being a fish out of water, so to speak, but at least part of it must be your willingness to engage the character you selected. As you put it, you were “in the mood to be wholesome” and this led you to select a wholesome avatar. But perhaps this wholesome avatar then increased your desire to be wholesome. The tricky thing with the Proteus effect is the difficulty in separating cause and effect in online behavior.
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