Kyrlitsias Christos, Michael-Grigoriou Despina, Banakou Domna, Christofi Maria
GET Lab, Department of Multimedia and Graphic Arts, Cyprus University of Technology, Limassol, Cyprus.
Research Centre on Interactive Media, Smart Systems and Emerging Technologies - RISE, Nicosia, Cyprus.
Front Psychol. 2020 Sep 8;11:2254. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.02254. eCollection 2020.
Immersive virtual reality (IVR) can induce an experience of "social presence" which can, in turn, increase social influence. Non-verbal behavior such as eye contact is an important component of human communication and, therefore, an important factor in creating social presence. This paper presents an experimental study that elaborates social influence through conformity with a group of virtual agents within an immersive virtual environment (IVE). Specifically, it investigates the impact of the agents' gaze behavior on social presence and influence. An experiment based on the Asch (1951) paradigm using two levels of agents' gaze behavior (Eye Contact condition vs. No-Eye Contact condition) was conducted. The results showed that participants conformed with the agents as they gave significantly more incorrect responses to the trials that the agents also gave an incorrect response, compared to those trials that the agents gave correct answers. However, no impact of the agents' gaze behavior on conformity was observed, even if the participants in the Eye Contact condition reported a higher sense of social presence. In addition, self-reported measures showed a number of social effects that occurred only in the eye contact condition, indicating that the agents' gaze behavior has an impact on participants' experience.
沉浸式虚拟现实（IVR）能够引发“社交临场感”体验，进而增强社会影响力。诸如眼神交流等非言语行为是人际沟通的重要组成部分，因此也是营造社交临场感的重要因素。本文呈现了一项实验研究，该研究通过在沉浸式虚拟环境（IVE）中与一组虚拟代理保持一致来阐述社会影响力。具体而言，它探究了代理的注视行为对社交临场感和影响力的影响。基于阿施（1951年）范式进行了一项实验，该实验采用了两种代理注视行为水平（眼神交流条件与无眼神交流条件）。结果表明，与代理给出正确答案的试验相比，当代理也给出错误答案时，参与者在试验中给出的错误答案明显更多，即参与者会与代理保持一致。然而，即使处于眼神交流条件下的参与者报告有更高的社交临场感，但未观察到代理的注视行为对一致性有影响。此外，自我报告测量显示了一些仅在眼神交流条件下出现的社会效应，这表明代理的注视行为对参与者的体验有影响。
