Embodied Avatars in Cinematic Virtual Reality : Effects on Presence, Social Presence, and Spatial Referencing.

The increasing availability of modern head-mounted displays have spurred interest in social virtual reality (VR) applications, but their immersion-inducing features limit the use of important nonverbal social cues in multiuser contexts. Embodied avatars have proven useful in increasing the social affordances of real-time rendered VR applications but remain underexplored in cinematic virtual reality (CVR). In the present study, three different conditions were evaluated in co-located CVR where participants watched 360° videos together in pairs; one condition had no visual representation of the co-watcher, one condition had a translucent cone representing the co-watcher’s viewing direction, and one condition had both the cone and a set of hands representing the co-watcher. Social presence was measured through the Networked Minds Social Presence Inventory and a semantic differential scale, presence was measured through the iGroup Presence Questionnaire, and participants’ use of implicit and explicit spatial references (i.e., “there” versus “next to the blue house”) was analyzed. The results indicate that simple embodied avatars can increase presence and social presence in CVR, and lead to more face-to-face-like verbal behavior. Intresset för sociala VR-applikationer har stigit i takt med spridningen av moderna VR-glasögon, men applikationer för två eller fler användare är svåra att realisera i och med att glasögonen blockerar viktiga ickeverbala sociala signaler. I realtidsrenderad VR har de sociala interaktionsmöjligheterna kunnat förbättras genom så kallade embodied avatars men deras effekt har hittills inte undersökts i cinematisk VR (CVR). I den här studien utforskades tre betingelser av embodied avatars i ett CVR-experiment där deltagarpar tittade på 360° filmer tillsammans i ett rum. En betingelse saknade avatar, i en betingelse representerades ens partners blickfång av en halvgenomskinlig kona, och i en betingelse representerades ens partner av både konan samt ett par virtuella händer. Social presence mättes genom the Networked Minds Social Presence Inventory och en semantic differential scale, presence mättes genom the iGroup Presence Questionnaire, och deltagarnas användning av implicita (”där”) och explicita (”bredvid det blå huset”) spatiala uttalanden analyserades. Resultaten visar att enkla embodied avatars kan öka både presence och social presence i CVR, samt leda till verbal kommunikation som liknar den vi använder i när vi interagerar ansikte mot ansikte