I played the game Second Life, a computer-based multi-player virtual reality. The space was synchronous and allowed each user to create an avatar resembling a human person. Second Life allowed me to alter every aspect of my appearance such as nose size or hand size. All cues collected through the game were based on the avatar or text-based cues.
Upon entering the space, I chose one of the five default avatar types: Girl next door, Harajuku, Gothic, City, or Club. I chose Girl next door. Based on Yee & Bailenson’s attractiveness rating, my avatar was at medium attractiveness. I was mostly ignored for the first half of my experience. I had regular brown hair, a purple sweater, tennis shoes, and jeans. When I happened upon new communities, I collected new clothing and altered my appearance. I made my avatar taller and increased its attractiveness to high attractiveness. After doing this, I was not only greeted more often, but I received many private IMs. I was distinct from everyone else because I was relatively simple in my attire yet unique because my clothes were not from a popular store.
The Proteus Effect describes the change in a person’s behavior to conform to that which others would expect them to have. In terms of virtual reality, users may conform to the stereotypes or expectations of their avatars. In the case of my one hour experience, the Proteus Effect was supported. When my avatar was shorter, people would bump into me, ignore me, and remain annoying close to me so that my view was blocked. Upon increasing my height, I found less people bumping into me. Rather, I began to bump into others. Also, others were surprised to realize that I described myself as shy. They would often say I didn’t seem shy. After hearing this, I began to act less shy, especially as more people began to individually message me.
Overall, my experience supported the article by Yee & Bailenson. The attractiveness and height of my avatar affected my behavior. I conformed to the beliefs of those around me; the more tall I became, the more assertive I was; the more attractive I became, the more liked and noticed I was. I also began to act more assertively and felt more confident in the space I was in.
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3 comments:
I like your post in that it was simple and to the point. All of your information was able to correspond nicely with Yee & Bailenson's theory. It was interesting that you were able to confirm to the stereotype's of the way people reacted to women in general based on physical appearance, even in an online space.
Unlike you, I did not experience a Proteus Effect while playing Second Life. I wonder what accounts for the difference in our experience? Because I knew I was performing an experiment, it was hard for me to get lost in the game. Maybe the answer is as simple as our focus on different things. Your description of your changing shy behavior sounds like you might have also experienced some behavioral confirmation. Overall, I really enjoyed your post. I too found it easy to read and thought your observations were interesting. Nice work!
I enjoyed reading your post a lot. Your experience combined well with Yee&Bailenson's theory and you made a nicely formed description. I feel that to make your point more convincing, it might be better to change your looking , and see how people reacted to the new feature. I found it interesting. When I put 20 pounds on my "hot" body, the number of people who talked to me decreased immediately.
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