In our group in class last week we touched briefly on some ideas about how people behave in second life in comparison to real life. Two questions come to mind. (1) Does your avatar look like you, or like someone completely different than you? (2) Do you socialize the same way in SL as in real life? e.g. if you are introverted in real life, are you introverted in SL, or do you behave differently?
For myself, I have an avatar that looks as much like me as I could make it. Well, as much like me as I could make it in the 15 minutes I spent on it, spending more time than that is not worth it to me. And I behave much the same. I am pretty introverted in real life and I find myself walking around groups of people to intentionally avoid contact in SL the same way I would in real life. While I could look completely different and be outgoing, I have no desire to do this. I wonder if certain groups of people tend to be more like their real life personalities than others? For example, are introverts more likely to be like their real selves?
Anyone else?
3 comments:
I laugh at people when they get mad at me for spawning a pink pig mobile with annoying particle effects, if that's what you mean =)
Considering my limitations (My old laptop died before the semester started and my Mac doesn't come in til next week), I haven't spent much time in SL AT ALL!!
However, I spent a couple hours trying to make my avatar look as much like me as possible. I started out by picking the City Chic avatar, and about 20 minutes into SL, I regretted that I didn't go with the Girl Next Door avatar, because the more time I spent changing what "I" looked like, the more I realized that this would have been done so much faster, had I just accepted the fact that I indeed am the girl next door.
In real life, I tend to be completely oblivious and unaware of my surroundings, and this has been proven more than true in SL. I can never tell if someone's "talking" to me unless they state my name or I start the conversation (which I never do). Also, I'm having a RIDICULOUS time finding my way around. In this case, I kinda wish I wasn't "acting" like myself, because I would probably have gotten so much done.
So, in a nutshell...I guess "I" am exactly like me.
Interesting post, David.
A few questions come to mind.
1. How would you measure behavior change?
2. Have you read Black, et al's piece on avatar characteristics? It's pretty interesting and was done as a result of research that came out of Dr. Ferdig's gaming course.
3. How would you measure avatar characteristics?
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