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Explicating How Skill Determines the Qualities of User-Avatar Bonds.
Teresa Lynch1, Nicholas L Matthews1, Michael Gilbert1
1School of Communication, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, United States.
User skill in digital environments is key to forming strong user-avatar bonds (UAB). Higher skill leads to better engagement and connection within virtual spaces, grounded in ecological perception and systems theory.
Area of Science:
- Human-Computer Interaction
- Virtual Reality Studies
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Existing frameworks explain user-avatar interaction.
- The user-avatar bond (UAB) is central to digital engagement.
- Understanding UAB drivers is crucial for designing effective virtual experiences.
Purpose of the Study:
- To propose a theoretical framework for user-avatar bonds (UAB).
- To identify user skill as a primary predictor of avatar engagement.
- To explain the mechanisms linking skill, engagement, and UAB.
Main Methods:
- Theoretical analysis integrating ecological perception and systems theory.
- Defining user skill as successful agency enactment.
- Conceptualizing stable action coupling and embeddedness in digital environments.
Main Results:
- Skill orders user experience in digital environments.
- Stable action coupling leads to embeddedness.
- Embeddedness promotes motivational attunement and influences environmental affordances.
Conclusions:
- User skill is a critical factor influencing the user-avatar bond (UAB).
- The proposed framework explains how skill impacts engagement through perception and systems theory.
- This theory offers testable hypotheses for future research on UAB.
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