User Avatar Association in Virtual Worlds

Human embodiment in virtual worlds is becoming increasingly popular in this day and age. Many researchers argue the need for investigation into human involvement in virtual worlds. We aim to investigate the human involvement in virtual worlds such as Second Life. This is increasingly popular on Second Life which is a 3-D dimensional digital role-playing environment where users create avatars to interact with other users. It is essential to understand if users portray themselves in such environments and understand the complications of using fabricated identities. This paper investigates different attributes of identity users use to build their avatar and how the level of avatar customization corresponds to the degree of user-avatar association. Two experiments were conducted using qualitative methodology to distinguish users' perception of the virtual environment as well as to understand the relationship between the user and its avatar. The findings from the experiments indicated that the relationship between the user and avatar creates an effective interaction between other users. The findings have also indicated that the use of social identities is becoming popular on virtual environments. Public awareness of the use of multiple identities on virtual environments needs to be enhanced to reduce users becoming victims of inappropriate activities in Virtual Worlds.