AERA 2011, ARVEL SIG session. MUVE Your Avatar presents the results of the March 2010 dissertation work.

1. Sabine Lawless-Reljic, Ed.D AERA 2011 Annual Meeting, ARVEL SIG session New Orleans, Louisiana, April 10, 2011

4. The actors have changed @Sabine Lawless-Reljic, 2010

7. The actors have changed How to infuse your technological proxy of your humanity to be perceived by your students as a present and empathic individual?

11. Research Questions This experimental study explored the following: RQ1: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the avatar-mediated instructor influence instructor immediacy? RQ2: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the avatar-mediated instructor influence instructor social presence? RQ3: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the avatar-mediated students influence perceived students’ co-presence? RQ4: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the avatar-mediated instructor influence learning outcomes? (*) The researcher predicted that projection of instructor immediacy behaviors through an avatar in the context of didactic instruction would positively influence perception of the instructor immediacy, instructor social presence, and student co-presence. * H4 = avatar-based immediacy behaviors would positively influence cognitive learning. Probe not prediction.

12. Theoretical Framework PRESENCE Short, Williams, & Christie (1976) Social Presence : The degree of salience of other persons in the interaction and the consequent salience (and perceived intimacy and immediacy) of the interpersonal relationships. >>Cognitive synthesis of several factors such as capacity to transmit information about facial expression, direction of looking, posture and nonverbal cues . Heeter (1992) Personal presence : a measure of the extent to which and the reasons why a person feel as if she/he is in a vw. Social presence : degree to which other beings represented in a vw, both living and synthetic, appear to respond to one’s existence or actions. (behaviorism) Environmental presence : VE responds to a person’s actions. Lombard and Ditton (1997) Illusion of non-mediation.

13. Theoretical Framework, part 2 PRESENCE Witmer and Singer (1998) Subjective experience of being in one place or environments, even as one is physically situated in another. Rourke, Anderson, Archer, and Garrison (1999) Social Presence : The ability of learners to project themselves socially and affectively into a community of inquiry. Russo (2001) Social presence : degree to which a person is perceived to the “real” in a mediated environment and the degree to which they recognize that they are communicating with another human being through a mediating technology. Biocca and Harms (2004): Copresence = sensory awareness of the embodied other + mutual awareness + attentional awareness

14. Theoretical Framework, part 3 IMMEDIACY Mehrabian (1966): a measure of the psychological distance which a communicator puts between himself and the object of her communication. Andersen (1971): physical approach and avoidance behaviors that may include verbal and nonverbal components. Christophel (1990): perception of physical or psychological closeness between communicators. This study: Measure of the number, combination, and intensity of immediacy behaviors in relevant and appropriate learning event contexts according to modern American presentation conventions Frequency + Intensity + Appropriate use of behaviors

19. Materials: Stimulus Materials Automated Immediacy Behaviors in SL Standard gestures library

20. Materials: Stimulus Materials Controlled Immediacy Behaviors in SL Animation Overrider Head-Up Display & Menu

21. Materials: Stimulus Materials Snapshot of Instructor Avatar used in Study

25. Materials: Data Collection (cont’d) Participants then completed the following items: Pre-Treatment Questionnaire 1-Demographic questions 2-Online and virtual world familiarity 3-Pretest of cognitive learning items Treatment 4- Pre-recorded 28-minute machinima Post-Treatment Questionnaire 5-Instructor immediacy questionnaire 6-Instructor social presence questionnaire 7-Student co-presence questionnaire 8-Posttest of cognitive learning items.

30. Results: Immediacy RQ1: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the instructor-avatar influence instructor immediacy? Mean Scores for Immediacy Significant difference with only pairs: 1 (HiHi) and 3 (LoHi) p = .001 1 (HiHi) and 4 (LoLo) p = .032 Groups Mean Scores Group 1 (HiHi) n = 28 Group 2 (HiLo) n = 29 Group 3 (LoHi) n = 28 Group 4 (LoLo) n = 32 64.39 53.44 36.64 45.13

31. Results: Social Presence RQ2: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the instructor-avatar influence instructor social presence? Mean Scores for Instructor Social Presence Only pair NOT sig. dif: Group 3 (LoHi) & Group 4 (LoLo) p = .995 Strong positive correlation between avatar immediacy and instructor social presence: r = .769, n = 111, p < .0005 Groups Mean Scores Group 1 (HiHi) n = 62 Group 2 (HiLo) n = 52 Group 3 (LoHi) n = 58 Group 4 (LoLo) n = 61 29.79 20.36 14.15 13.68

32. Results: Student Co-Presence RQ3: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the student-avatar influence perceived students’ co-presence? Mean Scores for Students Co-Presence Open-Ended Item # 5: Describe the student-avatar behaviors which positively influenced your perception of the students. No sig. dif . Groups Mean Scores Group 1 (HiHi) n = 32 Group 2 (HiLo) n = 50 Group 3 (LoHi) n = 43 Group 4 (LoLo) n = 46 29.53 30.56 21.53 28.71 Aspects of the machinima Number of responses Interactive participation Acted like real students Were attentive Used gestures 45 39 28 22

33. Results: Learning RQ4: Do immediacy behaviors projected by the instructor-avatar influence cognitive learning outcomes? Mean Scores for Pretest and Posttest no sig. dif. between the groups as measured by the immediate posttest scores ( F (3, 277) = 1.379, p = .249 Negative relationship between avatar immediacy and learning outcomes r = ‑.50, n = 117, p = .000 Groups Pretest Mean Scores Posttest Mean Scores Group 1 (HiHi) n = 68 Group 2 (HiLo) n = 74 Group 3 (LoHi) n = 69 Group 4 (LoLo) n = 70 3.67 3.75 4.14 3.50 5.57 5.02 5.63 5.35

34. Results: Open-Ended Items Item 1: Number of students who indicated they perceived the instructor avatar as real Item 2: categories of Aspects of the machinima that made the instructor avatar seem real Perceived Instructor as ‘real’ Group 1 (HiHi) n = 65 Group 2 (HiLo) n = 67 Group 3 (LoHi) n = 67 Group 4 (LoLo) n = 64 Yes No 53 12 41 23 16 51 18 46 Aspect of the machinima Number of responses It was a real voice Used gestures, facial expressions, moved body His character looked like a real person/teacher He was accessible (personal info, caring, ‘us’, emotions…) Interacted with students, called them by first names Encouraged students to be involved, asked questions 79 44 32 29 27 21

35. Results: Open Ended Items Items 5 & 6: Positive/Negative Student-Avatars’ Behaviors Item 7: Environment is distracting Positive Behaviors Negative Behaviors Participated in class Felt together like a classroom Used humor Were different and unique Interacted with instructor Were friendly Sitting attentive Were like real students Move realistically Showed engagement Did not do anything Looked bored It’s fake anyway Diversity is distracting Ridiculous, weird Slowed down instructor Did not look realistic Did not talk Gestures distracted They can’t see me Group 1 ( n = 64) Group 2 ( n = 66) Group 3 ( n = 60) Group 4 ( n = 66) Yes No 24 40 31 35 31 35 15 41