Abstract
Despite increasing research on user perception, action, and behavior via avatars in virtual spaces, few studies exist on user behavior on social virtual reality (VR) platforms. We focus on physical contact, the most fundamental mode of human communication, and investigate the effects of gender factors on physical contact among social VR users in a virtual space. Using VRChat, a social VR platform, as a field, we collected data for 168 general users by observing their responses when a confederate approached them. We analyzed three factors: the apparent gender of the avatar of the interaction partner (2 levels: male and female), the actual gender of the interaction partner (2 levels: male and female), and whether their natural voice is used (2 levels: with and without voice). The results showed that when the actual gender of a user’s interaction partner was female, the user had more frequent and intimate physical contact, such as hugging and patting the head. In contrast, the apparent gender of the avatar of the user’s partner did not affect the frequency of physical contact. Furthermore, users had more frequent physical contact when not speaking than when speaking with their natural voice. These results suggest that the actual gender of a partner affects user behavior more than the apparent gender of the partner’s avatar.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Barnlund, D.C.: Communicative Styles of Japanese and Americans. Wadsworth Publishing Co Inc., Belmont (1988)
Schwind, V., Knierim, P., Tasci, C., Franczak, P., Haas, N., Henze, N.: These are not my hands!”: effect of gender on the perception of avatar hands in virtual reality. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI 2017, pp. 1577–1582 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1145/3025453.3025602
Bönsch, A., et al.: Social VR: how personal space is affected by virtual agents emotions. In: Proceedings of the IEEE VR 2018, pp. 199–206 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1109/VR.2018.8446480
Beltran, K., Rowland, C., Hashemi, N., Nguyen, A., Harrison, L., Engle, S., Yuksel, B.: Reducing implicit gender bias using a virtual workplace environment. In: Extended Abstracts of ACM CHI 2021, pp. 1–7 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1145/3411763.3451739
Gonzalez-Franco, M., Steed, A., Hoogendyk, S., Ofek, E.: Using facial animation to increase the enfacement illusion and avatar self-identification. IEEE Trans. Visual Comput. Graphics 26(5), 2023–2029 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2020.2973075
Seyama, J., Nagayama, R.S.: The uncanny valley: effect of realism on the impression of artificial human faces. Presence: Teleoperators Virtual Environ. 16(4), 337–351 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1162/pres.16.4.337
Oh, S.Y., Bailenson, J., Krämer, N., Li, B.: Let the avatar brighten your smile: effects of enhancing facial expressions in virtual environments. PLoS ONE 11(9), e0161794 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0161794
Argelaguet, F., Hoyet, L., Trico, M., Lécuyer, A.: The role of interaction in virtual embodiment: effects of the virtual hand representation. In: Proceedings of the IEEE VR 2016, pp. 3–10 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1109/VR.2016.7504682
Lin, L., Jörg, S.: Need a hand? How appearance affects the virtual hand illusion. In: Proceedings of the ACM SAP 2016, pp. 69–76 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1145/2931002.2931006
Maister, L., Slater, M., Sanchez-Vives, M.V., Tsakiris, M.: Changing bodies changes minds: owning another body affects social cognition. Trends Cogn. Sci. 19(1), 6–12 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2014.11.001
Ogawa, N., Narumi, T., Kuzuoka, H., Hirose, M.: Do you feel like passing through walls?: Effect of self-avatar appearance on facilitating realistic behavior in virtual environments. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI 2020, pp. 1–14 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1145/3313831.3376562
Koulouris, J., Jeffery, Z., Best, J., O’Neill, E., Lutteroth, C.: Me vs. Super (wo) man: effects of customization and Identification in a VR Exergame. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI 2020, pp. 1–17 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1145/3313831.3376661
Latoschik, M.E., Roth, D., Gall, D., Achenbach, J., Waltemate, T., Botsch, M.: The effect of avatar realism in immersive social virtual realities. In: Proceedings of the ACM VRST 2017, pp. 39:1–39:10 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1145/3139131.3139156
Gonzalez-Franco, M., Lanier, J.: Model of illusions and virtual reality. Front. Psychol. 8, 1125 (2017). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01125
Kilteni, K., Groten, R., Slater, M.: The sense of embodiment in virtual reality. Presence: Teleoperators Virtual Environ. 21(4), 373–387 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1162/PRES_a_00124
Shang, X., Kallmann, M., Arif, A.S.: Effects of virtual agent gender on user performance and preference in a VR training program. In: Arai, K., Bhatia, R. (eds.) FICC 2019. LNNS, vol. 69, pp. 482–495. Springer, Cham (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12388-8_34
Lopez, S., et al.: Investigating implicit gender bias and embodiment of white males in virtual reality with full body visuomotor synchrony. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI 2019, pp. 1–12 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300787
Schwind, V., Henze, N.: Gender- and age-related differences in designing the characteristics of stereotypical virtual faces. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI PLAY 2018, pp. 463–475 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1145/3242671.3242692
Smith, H.J., Neff, M.: Communication behavior in embodied virtual reality. In: Proceedings of the ACM CHI 2018, pp. 1–12 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1145/3173574.3173863
Abdullah, A., Kolkmeier, J., Lo, V., Neff, M.: Videoconference and embodied VR: communication patterns across task and medium. In: Proceedings of the ACM CSCW2, vol. 453, pp. 1–29 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1145/3479597
Research Institute of Human Engineering for Quality Life.: Japanese Human Body Dimensions Database 2004–2006 (2007). https://www.hql.jp/database/cat/size/size2004
Acknowledgments
We wish to express our gratitude to the VRChat users who cooperated with us as users of our field study.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Tsuda, K., Ichino, J., Shimizu, K. (2023). Gender Effects on Physical Contact in Social VR. In: Chen, J.Y.C., Fragomeni, G. (eds) Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality. HCII 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14027. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-35634-6_50
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-35634-6_50
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-35633-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-35634-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)