To speak or not to speak:
Use of voice in Second Life
Nancy Jennings
(SL: Sweetpea Sunnyside)
Chris Collins
(SL: Fleep Tuque)
NCA 2008
Human Communication and
Technology Division

Functions of Voice
• Richness of interaction
– More genuine connections
– Need to surrender
anonymity to improve
relationships
• Fill in missing cues
– Human?
– Gender?
– Personality?
• Judgments
– Person’s intelligence
– Compatibility

Outcomes of Voice Use
• Williams, Caplan, &
Xiong (2007)
– Voice improved trust and
cooperation
– Voice insulated from
unexpected negative
impacts of text-only play
– Voice users had increased
happiness and less sense
of loneliness

Contextual Uses of Voice
• Voice may influence
task performance
• Voice may disrupt
social interaction
How IS voice used
in different
contexts?

Voice in Second Life
• First became available
on August 2, 2007
• Requirements for
voice use:
– Computer and Broadband
Internet connection
– Voice over IP (VoIP)
headset
• Types of Voice Chat
– Local
– Direct Calls
• Groups
• Individuals

How to Use Voice in SL
• Voice Tab
– Click and Hold TALK
button
• Push-to-Talk
– Basic: Key or mouse
triggers mic
– In toggle mode: key or
mouse button as a mic
toggle

Debate to use voice or NOT?
• Text • Voice
– Immersionist – Augmentationist
– Hearing-impaired – Small group collaborative
– Language barriers/accents project
– Lecture
– Teaching foreign language

Survey Method
• Online Survey
• Sent to SL listservs
and groups in-world
• Types of questions
– Transportation
– In-world activities
– Use of Voice in-world
– Demographics

RL Profile
• Gender
– RL: 50.5% Female
• Employment
– 75.2% employed full-time
• Relationship Status
– 71.4% in a long-term
relationship or married
• Race
– 82.8% Caucasian
• Average age: 47-years-old

SL Profile
• Hours spent in-world/week
– 21.7% - 21-40 hours/week
• How old is Avatar?
– On average, been in-world since 2006
• Comfort with SL
– 60.2% very comfortable
• Gender of Primary Avatar
– 50.5% Female

Transportation
• Sense of being there
– 64.1%: Held a strong
sense of “being there”
– 66.4%: Events in-world
changed their lives.
– 79.1%: Being in-world
affects me emotionally.

In-world Activities
• Frequency of doing different
activities:
– Most commonly reported
activity: Chatting with people
using text such as local chat
or IM (64.2%) – Very often
– Least commonly reported
activity: Creating scripts –
31.1% had never created
scripts.

Use of Voice in-world
• Most had used voice (86.8%)
• Why not use voice?
– Voice is too personal
– Distracting when voice doesn’t
“match” visual representation
– Hearing impaired
– Do not know how to use it
– Old habits of texting are hard to
break!

Technical Difficulties
• Of those who have used
voice, 78.5% experienced
technical difficulties
– Setup
– Feedback and echoes
– Interference from
neighboring conversations
– Control panels
• Stuck mic button
• Difficult to use

Context of Voice Use
• By Activity
– Text
• Talk with friends about
personal issues (82%)
• Meet someone new (92.4%)
– Voice
• Work with others on a task
(46.7%)
• By Person
– 84.8% - text-only
– 22.0% - voice-only

When to use Text and Voice
• Voice • Text
– Group presentations – Meeting new people
– Privacy (no record) – Superficial encounters
– Intonation – When others are around in
– Personal Disability RL
• Carpal Tunnel – When interaction needs to
• Blind be recorded
– Advising newbies – Side-band conversations
– Lack of hardware

What does this mean?
• SL does give a sense of “being there.”
• Most common form of communication is
still text-based - but context and function
matters