The computer based videogame that I decided to play was Second Life. Researching a lot about this MUD through last week’s assignment on PIU, I was really excited to do this activity. My excitement did not stay for long as I realized that I was actually bored of being on Second Life. However, to have good results for this assignment, I decided to interact with others on Second Life first and then read the Yee & Bailenson (2007) study. After reading the study, I noticed that only some of my experiences on Second Life matched this paper.
As soon as I registered and got on Second Life, I had to select an avatar and get a name. I choose to be “the boy next door” and named myself Sabbar Sang. Yee states in their paper that, “users in online environment may conform to expectations and stereotypes of the idedntity of their avatars.” Following this Proteus Effect and being the Boy next door I should have been a little shy, but due to this assignment I started chatting with everyone out there. Therefore, I did not observe myself acting like the boy next door but I did meet other people who were trying to act like their avatars. I met various people just starting their time on Second Life and many of these people had already started acting like their avatar. One of these avatars was a “party boy” and he kept making comments that he thought were cool such as, “yo, wanna hang out” etc. I could notice that he was acting and trying to be cool by acting like his “party boy” avatar and keeping up the personality of his character. Therefore, the Proteus effect and behavioral conformations were definitely seen on Second Life.
In addition to checking for these two factors I also assessed how well some of the conclusions of Yee and Balienson worked out on my experience with Second Life. One of these conclusions was that, “the attractiveness of the avatars impacted how intimate participants were willing to be with a stranger.” I experienced a little bit of this when I noticed myself approaching more to avatars. This behavior goes hand in hand with Yee’s first experiment where they found that, “participants in the attractive condition walked significantly closer to confederate than participants in the unattractive condition”. I felt that I had an attractive avatar and due to my real identity being anonymous, I was more confident to approach someone. Moreover, I observed myself having longer conversations with avatars that were girls and were better looking. Another conclusion of Yee stated that, “the heights of the avatars impacted how confident participants became.” I did not notice this behavior to be present because even while talking to other avatars that looked bigger than me, I did not feel like they were overpowering or more dominant.
1 comment:
Saurin, it’s interesting that even though you did not feel like you particularly experienced some of the conclusions found in Yee & Bailenson, you noticed that other avatars in Second Life were conforming to the article’s description of the Proteus Effect and behavioral confirmations. I too found that it was easier to approach and talk to other attractive avatars of the opposite sex. Did you think that your behavior confirmation impacted the way other attractive avatars behaved towards you? For me, I think anonymity played an important role because it allowed me to be less aware of the self. I also did not notice that taller avatars were more dominant than others. People were generally friendly and open to meet others.
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