This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Park, S. Articles by Catrambone, R. Search for Related Content PubMed Articles by Park, S. Articles by Catrambone, R. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Social Facilitation Effects of Virtual Humans

Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, gtg116s{at}mail.gatech.edu

Richard Catrambone

Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia

Objective: To investigate whether virtual humans produce social facilitation effects. Background: When people do an easy task and another person is nearby, they tend to do that task better than when they are alone. Conversely, when people do a hard task and another person is nearby, they tend to do that task less well than when they are alone. This phenomenon is referred to in the social psychology literature as social facilitation. The present study investigated whether virtual humans can evoke a social facilitation response. Method: Participants were given different tasks to do that varied in difficulty. The tasks involved anagrams, mazes, and modular arithmetic. They did the tasks alone, in the company of another person, or in the company of a virtual human on a computer screen. Results: For easy tasks, performance in the virtual human condition was better than in the alone condition, and for difficult tasks, performance in the virtual human condition was worse than in the alone condition. Conclusion: As with a human, virtual humans can produce social facilitation. Application: The results suggest that designers of virtual humans should be mindful about the social nature of virtual humans; a design decision as to when and how to present a virtual human should be a deliberate and informed decision. An ever-present virtual human might make learning and performance difficult for challenging tasks.

Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Vol. 49, No. 6, 1054-1060 (2007)
DOI: 10.1518/001872007X249910


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?