Breaking the Virtual Ice: Antisocial Behaviors in Social Virtual Reality and How Developers Cope with Them
Breaking the Virtual Ice: Antisocial Behaviors in Social Virtual Reality and How Developers Cope with Them
Breaking the Virtual Ice: Antisocial Behaviors in Social Virtual Reality and How Developers Cope with Them
Yasaman Farazan
Abstract
“One of the complicated spaces in which players have a significant agency is virtual reality (VR). The demand for head-mounted displays is rising, and developers discover new potentials in VR, one of which is Social VR. Social VR refers to online applications that focus on socializing in immersive virtual worlds. In these online social environments, various players from different backgrounds, ages, or gender can participate in casual conversations, creating content, and playing games. On the darker side, users of these novel applications face behaviors that are not recommended by the developers or are not acceptable by the scales of real-world social norms. Social VR developers aim for a healthier and more welcoming place for as many players as possible and protect individuals' experiences. They have designed multiple social control tools to moderate toxic behaviors. Even though social VR has many characteristics in common with other social media services or digital games, it fosters unique interactions that stem from its immersive quality. Developers are providing more new tools to enable their users to tackle disturbing situations. This study aims to get closer to the social VR community to understand it better. We asked participants what kind of toxic behaviors and violations of terms they have encountered in these applications, how intensely inappropriate they find each of these behaviors, and whether they know about the provided social control tools. We distributed an online survey and collected and analyzed 96 responses from active players to reach this goal”.
Reference
Farazan, Y. Breaking the Virtual Ice: Antisocial Behaviors in Social Virtual Reality and How Developers Cope with Them. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349212255_Breaking_the_Virtual_Ice_Antisocial_Behaviors_in_Social_Virtual_Reality_and_How_Developers_Cope_with_Them
Keywords
virtual reality, playing games, developers