Social Experiences in Virtual Reality

The boom of commercial social virtual reality (VR) platforms in recent years has signaled the growth and wide-spread adoption of consumer VR. Social VR platforms draw aspects from traditional 2D virtual worlds where users engage in various immersive experiences, interactive activities, and choices in avatar-based representation. However, social VR also demonstrates specific nuances that extend …

Social virtual reality (VR) is increasingly becoming an emerging online social ecosystem where multiple users can interact with one another through VR head-mounted displays in 3Dvirtual spaces. The co-existence of minors and adults in social VR presents unique challenges and opportunities regarding how these two groups interact with each other in these shared virtual social spaces, which is a …

Social VR refers to 3D virtual spaces where multiple users can interact with one another through VR head-mounted displays. These novel digital spaces are dramatically transforming how people meet, interact, and socialize online and have attracted users of different age groups and maturity levels. This variety sometimes leads to less desirable interactions, tensions, and frustrations between …

Many questions still remain of the uses both positive and negative of virtual avatars. With virtual avatars primed for consumer entertainment, the effects they can elicit must be further investigated before mainstream adoption. In this paper we present an overview of the potential risks posed by virtual avatars. Followed by a study designed to investigate these risks, and finally ethical research …