Communicators' Perceptions of Social Presence as a Function of Avatar Realism in Small Display Mobile Communication Devices

This study describes an experiment in which 126 participants engaged via a mobile telephone simulation that included a visual display in a discussion that required self-disclosure and affective evaluation of the other participant. Participants in same gender and mixed gender dyads were represented by avatars that varied in visual realism (unmodified video, modified video, graphic display, or no visual display) and behavioral realism (static visual display versus dynamic or animated). Participants subsequently rated the Perceived Social Richness of the Medium and the Interactant Satisfaction with the conversation. Interactant Satisfaction was a new measure of social presence created to tap emotional and affective evaluations. Participants rated devices with higher-realism and more behaviorally realistic avatars as being more capable of effective social interaction, but their actual perceptions of affective dimensions of their conversational partner were essentially unaffected by visual representations.