The is the Week 5 Lecture for BHS3000 Digital Selves at Monash University Australia. Narrator is Debbie McCormick

1. Digital Self and Digital Others

2. What we’ll be looking at over the next three sessions Interpersonal communication Team collaboration The online expression and exploration of sexuality and alternative cultures

3. Seminar 1 Interpersonal Communication

4. What we’ll be looking at this week What is Communication What is Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) Why research CMC in a virtual world Affordances Gender and communication Cultural variances On- and off-line effects of avatar appearance

5. What is Communication When you meet someone, you develop a set of expectancies about the other person. You then act toward the person in a way that is consistent with your expectancies. The other person interprets the meaning of your actions. Based on this interpretation, the other person responds. You then interpret the meaning of the other person’s response. http://unix.temple.edu/~susanj/jou55/model.jpg DARLEY, J. M. & FAZIO, R. H. (1980) Expectancy confirmation processes arising in the social interaction sequence. American Psychologist, 35 (pp. 867-881

6. WhatisComputerMediatedCommunication(CMC)and whyresearchit? Main areas of research in relation to communication include the effects of: The absence of social context cues (i.e. Body language, facial expressions) Anonymity Gender and culture Published in The New Yorker September 12, 2005 Next is an excellent video that explains the changes to written communication that have been brought about by the advent of hypertext

7. How does computer mediation affect communication? The ‘real-world’ communication tools most often affected by computer mediation and environmental affordances include: voice gestures facial expression body

8. Grounding changes with the medium Co-presence Visibility Audibility Contemporality Simultaneity Sequentiality Reviewability Revisability

9. Affordances Affordance Theory – J.J Gibson Perception of the environment leads to some course of action Affordances of VWs which affect communication include: the ability to use and/or make Gestures the ability and extent to which an avatars appearance can be customised the extent to which an avatar can be animated and whether the environment uses text, speech or a mixture of the two http://www.learning-theories.com/affordance-theory-gibson.html

10. Disinhibition The freedom afforded by virtual environments along with diminished visual and auditory clues and the narrow bandwidth of communication can result in a state of, what has been described as disinhibition (Joinson, 2003)

11. Culture and CMC Cultures may draw on different channels of communication for conversational grounding Cultures may differ in interactional goals, making different media more or less appropriate Understanding interactions between culture and CMC is important for: • Building theories of collaborative technologies • Designing tools for global distribution and/or cross-cultural communication http://www.engr.udayton.edu/faculty/wsmari/cts06/CTS2006%20Lucheon%20-%20Notes.pdf

12. Cultural Variances and Variables http://www.geert-hofstede.com/hofstede_australia.shtml

13. Other Cultural Variances Context The extent to which information is made explicit or is assumed High-context culture Proxemics Clothing Emotes http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8199951.stm JACK, R. E., BLAIS, C., SCHEEPERS, C., SCHYNS, P. G., & CALDARA, R. (2008) Cultural Confusions Show Facial Expressions are Not Universal Current Biology, (in press)

15. The main reason men present as women is because they feel people are nicer to them and more likely to give them things (particularly relevant in a gaming environment) (Bruckman, 1993).

16. Gendered communication styles carry over into virtual environments

17. The anonymity or pseudo anonymity of virtual environments results in increased assertiveness for many women (Rodino, 1997).

18. When voice is available it presents a challenge for those who are presenting in the environment as a different gender or who prefer to present as gender neutral. The following video, while not strictly about communication is an interesting piece of gender research conducted in Second Life.

19. On- and Offline Effects of Avatar Appearance Creating an avatar is an act of visual communication What does YOUR avatar say about you? Inworld appearance can impact real life behaviour

20. Key Points Computer mediated communication is pervasive in Western society The use of virtual worlds for socialising, work and education is increasing Affordances will differ according to the environment Verbal and non-verbal cues may be altered or missing in CMC which may result in disinhibition Overall, gendered communication styles carry over in virtual environments ‘Inhabiting’ an avatar of a different race or culture will not necessarily provide you with an accurate experience of what it is like to come from a different race or culture and may, in fact, reinforce cultural stereotypes Avatars appearance can act back on the real-life behaviour

21. Further Reading BECKER, B. & MARK, G. (2002) Social Conventions in Computer Mediated Communication: A Comparison of Three Online Shared Virtual Environments. In SCHROEDER, R. (Ed.) The Social Life of Avatars. Surrey, UK, Springer. NAKAMURA, L. (2001) Race In/For Cyberspace: Identity Tourism and Racial Passing on the Internet. In TREND, D. (Ed.) Reading digital culture: Keyworks in cultural studies; 4. Malden, Mass.; Oxford, Blackwell Publishers. SLATER, M. & STEED, A. (2002) Meeting People Virtually: Experiments in Shared Virtual Environments. In SCHROEDER, R. (Ed.) The Social Life of Avatars. Surrey, UK, Springer. YEE, N. (2007) THE PROTEUS EFFECT: BEHAVIOURAL MODIFICATION VIA TRANSFORMATIONS OF DIGITAL SELF-REPRESENTATION. Communication. Palo Alto, CA, Stanford YEE, N. & BAILENSON, J. (2006) Walk A Mile in Digital Shoes: The Impact of Embodied Perspective-Taking on The Reduction of Negative Stereotyping in Immersive Virtual Environments. (Electronic Article). http://vhil.stanford.edu/pubs/2006/yee-digital-shoes.pdf, [date accessed] 8 November 2007 YEE, N., BAILENSON, J. N., URBANEK, M., CHANG, F. & MERGET, D. (2007) The Unbearable Likeness of Being Digital: The Persistence of Nonverbal Social Norms in Online Virtual Environments. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 10(1), 115-121. http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cpb.2006.9984

22. Further Reading Journal of Computer Mediated Communicationhttp://jcmc.indiana.edu/ SHERWIN, J. (2007) Get a (Second) Life Studying Behavior in a Virtual World. Observer. Association for Psychological Science, (Online Journal). http://www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/getArticle.cfm?id=2179, [date accessed] 12 August 2009 DANET, B. (1996) Computer-Mediated Communication. Jerusalem, Hebrew University, (Online article). http://pluto.mscc.huji.ac.il/~msdanet/cmc1.htm, [date accessed] 12 August 2009 MARVIN, L.-E. (1995) Spoof, Spam, Lurk and Lag: the aesthetics of Text-based Virtual Realities. Journal of Computer Mediated Communication. Play and Performance in CMC ed. Indiana, International Communication Association, (Online Journal). http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/120837658/HTMLSTART, [date accessed] 12 August 2009

23. References Cited in this Presentation BRUCKMAN, A. (1993) Gender Swapping on the Internet. The Internet Society. San Francisco, (Conference paper). http://www.mith2.umd.edu/WomensStudies/Computing/Articles+ResearchPapers/gender-swapping, [date accessed] 15 August 2009 GACKENBACH, J. & STACKELBERG, H. V. (2007) Self Online: Personality and Demographic Implications. In GACKENBACH, J. (Ed.) Psychology and the Internet. Burlington, MA, Elsevier. HALL, E. (1966) The Hidden Dimension, Anchor Books. JACK, R. E., BLAIS, C., SCHEEPERS, C., SCHYNS, P. G., & CALDARA, R. (2008) Cultural Confusions Show Facial Expressions are Not Universal Current Biology, (in press) JOINSON, A. N. (2003) Understanding the psychology of Internet behaviour : virtual worlds, real lives, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire ; New York, Palgrave Macmillan. MCLUHAN, M. (2001) Understanding media: The extensions of man. London ; New York, Routledge. NAKAMURA, L. (2001) Race In/For Cyberspace: Identity Tourism and Racial Passing on the Internet. In TREND, D. (Ed.) Reading digital culture: Keyworks in cultural studies ; 4. Malden, Mass. ; Oxford, Blackwell Publishers. PHILIPCHALK, R. P. & MCCONNELL, J. V. (1994) Understanding human behavior, Forth Worth, Tex., Harcourt Brace College Publishers. RODINO, M. (1997) Breaking out of Binaries: Reconceptualizing Gender and its Relationship to Language in Computer-Mediated Communication Journal of Computer Mediated Communication. Annenberg, University of Southern California, (Electronic Journal). http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol3/issue3/rodino.html, [date accessed] 18 August 2009 TAYLOR, T. L. (2002) Living Digitally: Embodiement in Virtual Worlds. In SCHROEDER, R. (Ed.) The Social Life of Avatars. London, Springer-Verlag. YEE, N. & BAILENSON, J. (2007) The Proteus Effect: The Effect of Transformed Self-Representation on Behavior. (in press in Human Communication Research). http://www.nickyee.com/pubs/Yee%20&%20Bailenson%20-%20Proteus%20Effect%20(in%20press).pdf, [date accessed]

24. Video Links CMC general http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAEIiguKAYU Animations and gestures http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_-3c_aC-O4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WplYhxyFd3M http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WKo4G8aQBc