You and your ugly avatar

More and more people have an online presence in virtual worlds, such as Second Life, in which their persona is encapsulated in an “avatar”, an often three-dimensional model or character meant to represent you as an individual. Of course, on the internet no one knows you’re a dog, so you can make your avatar look and behave in ways that are not possible or tenable in the offline world. Some people choose garish and flamboyant avatars, perhaps with hypersexuality or attractiveness, others choose an avatar that is more mundane, ugly event…

But, did you ever stop to think that just as in the offline world, people do judge you on initial impressions? What do those pink sash, stacked heels, gold satin loonpants and DD virtual breast implants say about you as a male bricklayer from Detroit? And, what do fellow ‘lifers really think about an exotic dancer masquerading as a male bricklayer from Detroit in her greasy tee-shirt, steel-toed workboots and crooked smile?

Leonie O’Brien of Trinity College Colac in Victoria, Australia and John Murnane of the University of Melbourne, Australia, carried out a little experiment recently to test the old maxim – don’t judge a book by its cover or its more modern, don’t judge a geek by its avatar.

They created a male and female avatar in a controlled environment with each avatar having an “attractive” and an “unattractive” representation. A computer algorithm decided what was attractive and what was not, which presumably helped them choose stereotypically attractive and unattractive characteristics that would appeal, or not, to the majority of users, without personal subjectivity intervening. Admittedly, they didn’t tweak clothing as I may have suggested for comic effect above, but they did use the algo to fine-tune the facial features of their test avatars. As these avatars, a male, “boy next door” avatar called Bob Blum and a female “girl next door” called Dimity Lei, went about being active in their community a fairly obvious phenomenon emerged depending on how the team had tweaked their attractiveness.

“Making the avatars attractive was enjoyable,” the team says, but, “making them unattractive was far
more interesting.” The first thing they changed was facial symmetry, eyes were widened, noses enlarged, and their mouths given a crooked tilt, lips were made narrow and pale. Bob and Dimity put on a little weight and their arms and legs were made disproportional. Basically, they both got a virtual make-under. Changes were not extreme, just enough to make them unattractive, but not so un-human that they’d attract attention on that score alone.

They dropped Bob and Dimity on to Help Island at the same time of day (attractive and unattractive on different days) and watched the ensuing interactions.

The attractive male received the most total attention. Nine out of 12 passing avatars made some kind of spoken communication with him, the team says. The attractive female received the most attention from males. Some were very forward in immediately making comments about her body, but the majority of males were offering to teach her things or asking her to show them certain things such as how to
change outfits. Males tended to group around this female and all talk at once, vying for her attention.

The unattractive male was largely ignored by those walking by. Two of the three people who did speak to him said “hi” and moved on, ignoring his responses.

The unattractive female received a quick “hello” from one male avatar who then simply flew off. No females made any attempt to come near the unattractive female avatar. It appeared that some even deliberately avoided her.

In line with similar studies in real life, we found that attractive people are more likely to be included in conversations and interactions in a virtual online environment and are more likely to be offered friendship than their more unattractive counterparts.

This brings to light some interesting questions about the deeper interactions that can occur in virtual worlds and why some users deliberately choose an “unattractive” avatar, in a world where you can pretend to be perfect why would you choose to be ugly, especially when it seems to arouse suspicion and deters conversation.

“It is interesting that these reactions occurred despite the fact that all operators know that the physical (or other) characteristics of an avatar are in no way necessarily representative of that person in real life, and in fact, probably are not. Is there an underlying assumption that the physical appearance of the avatar is somehow an actual reflection of the personality of the person controlling it or does physical appearance alone dictate their reactions, dominating over other characteristics?” the team says.

It seems that if you want to get more friends in the virtual world it pays to make your avatar stereotypically attractive, don’t twist its mouth, make sure the eyes are nice and straight and perhaps opt for the satin loonpants and DD cup, especially if you’re some average Joe from Detroit and looking for some virtual company.

O’Brien, L., & Murnane, J. (2009). An investigation into how avatar appearance can affect interactions in a virtual world International Journal of Social and Humanistic Computing, 1 (2) DOI: 10.1504/IJSHC.2009.031007