Virtual community: Difference between revisions

The human computer interactions that are measured during a usability experience test focus on the individuals rather than their social interactions in the online community. The success of online communities depend on the integration of usability and social semiotics. Usability testing metrics can be used to determine social codes by evaluating a user's habits when interacting with a program. Social codes are established and reinforced by the regular repetition of behavioral patterns.<ref name="Semiotics">{{cite book |last1=Chandler |first1=Daniel |title=Semiotics: The Basics |date=2007 |publisher=Routledge |location=Abingdon, Oxon |edition=3}}</ref> People communicate their social identities or [[culture code]] through the work they do, the way they talk, the clothes they wear, their eating habits, domestic environments and possessions, and use of leisure time. Usability testing metrics can be used to determine social codes by evaluating a user's habits when interacting with a program.The information provided during a usability test can determine demographic factors and help define the semiotic social code. Dialogue and social interactions, support information design, navigation support, and accessibility are integral components specific to online communities. As virtual communities grow, so do the diversity of their users. However, the technologies are not made to be any more or less intuitive. Usability tests can ensure users are communicating effectively using social and semiotic codes while maintaining their social identities.<ref name="Preece" /> Efficient communication requires a common set of signs in the minds of those seeking to communicate.<ref name="Semiotics" /> As technologies evolve and mature, they tend to be used by an increasingly diverse set of users. This kind of increasing complexity and evolution of technology doesn'tdoes no necessarily mean that the technologies are becoming easier to use.<ref name="Morgan Kaufmann" /> Usability testing in virtual communities can ensure users are communicating effectively through social and semiotic codes and maintenance of social realities and identities.<ref name="Semiotics" />

Recent studies have looked into development of health related communities and their impact on those already suffering health issues. These forms of social networks allow for open conversation between individuals who are going through similar experiences, whether themselves or in their family.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Eysenbach |first=G |year=2008 |title= The Impact of the Internet on Cancer Outcomes. A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, 53(6), 356–371 |journal=CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians |volume=53 |issue=6 |pages=356–371 |doi=10.3322/canjclin.53.6.356 |pmid=15224975 |citeseerx=10.1.1.526.4309 |s2cid=10192148 }}</ref> Such sites have so grown in popularity that now many health care providers form groups for their patients by providing web areas where one may direct questions to doctors. These sites prove especially useful when related to rare medical conditions. People with rare or debilitating disorders may not be able to access support groups in their physical community, thus online communities act as primary means for such support. Online health communities can serve as supportive outlets as they facilitate connecting with others who truly understand the disease, as well as offer more practical support, such as receiving help in adjusting to life with the disease.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.npr.org/2011/04/04/135106113/patients-with-rare-diseases-connect-online |title=Web Communities Help Patients With Rare Diseases |website=NPR.org |publisher=NPR |access-date=2012-07-10 |archive-date=18 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171018152136/http://www.npr.org/2011/04/04/135106113/patients-with-rare-diseases-connect-online |url-status=live }}</ref> Each patient on online health communities are on there for different reasons, as some may need quick answers to questions they have, or someone to talk to.Involvement in social communities of similar health interests has created a means for patients to develop a better understanding and behavior towards treatment and health practices.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Neal |first1=L. |last2=Lindgagarrd |first2=G. |last3=Oakley |first3=K. |last4=Hansen |first4=D. |last5=Kogan |first5=S. |last6=Leimeister |first6=J.M. |last7=Selker |first7=T. |year=2006 |title=Online Health Communities. CHI, 444–447 |url=http://www.uni-kassel.de/fb7/ibwl/leimeister/pub/JML_109.pdf |access-date=10 July 2012 |archive-date=12 July 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120712151749/http://www.uni-kassel.de/fb7/ibwl/leimeister/pub/JML_109.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Cocciolo |first1=A. |last2=Mineo |first2=C. |last3=Meier |first3=E. |title=Using Online Social Networks to Build Healthy Communities: A Design-based Research Investigation. 1–10 |url=http://www.thinkingprojects.org/bhc_paper.pdf |access-date=10 July 2012 |archive-date=15 October 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121015141134/http://www.thinkingprojects.org/bhc_paper.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Some of these users could have very serious life-threatening issues which these personal contexts could become very helpful to these users, as the issues are very complex.<ref name="Huh 212–225">{{Cite journal |last1=Huh |first1=Jina |last2=Kwon |first2=Bum Chul |last3=Kim |first3=Sung-Hee |last4=Lee |first4=Sukwon |last5=Choo |first5=Jaegul |last6=Kim |first6=Jihoon |last7=Choi |first7=Min-Je |last8=Yi |first8=Ji Soo |date=2016-10-01 |title=Personas in online health communities |journal=Journal of Biomedical Informatics |language=en |volume=63 |pages=212–225 |doi=10.1016/j.jbi.2016.08.019 |pmid=27568913 |pmc=5268468 |issn=1532-0464 }}</ref> Patients increasingly use such outlets, as this is providing personalized and emotional support and information, that will help them and have a better experience.<ref name="Huh 212–225"/> The extent to which these practices have effects on health are still being studied.

Previous concerns about the effects of Internet use on community and family fell into two categories: 1) sustained, intimate human relations "are critical to well-functioning human beings as a matter of psychological need" and 2) people with "[[social capital]]" are better off than those who lack it. It leads to better results in terms of political participation.<ref name="Benkler" /> However, Benkler argues that unless Internet connections actually displace direct, unmediated, human contact, there is no basis to think that using the Internet will lead to a decline in those nourishing connections we need psychologically, or in the useful connections we make socially. Benkler continues to suggest that the nature of an individual changes over time, based on social practices and expectations. There is a shift from individuals who depend upon locally embedded, unmediated and stable social relationships to networked individuals who are more dependent upon their own combination of strong and weak ties across boundaries and weave their own fluid relationships. Manuel Castells calls this the '"networked society'".<ref name="Benkler" />

The gaming community is extremely vast and accessible to a wide variety of people, However, there are negative effects on the relationships '"gamers'" have with the medium when expressing identity of gender. [[Adrienne Shaw]] notes in her 2012 article "Do you identify as a gamer? Gender, race, sexuality, and gamer identity", that gender, perhaps subconsciously, plays a large role in identifying oneself as a '"gamer".'<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Shaw|first=Adrienne|date=2012|title=Do you identify as a gamer? Gender, race, sexuality, and gamer identity|journal=New Media & Society|volume=14 | issue = 1 |pages=28–44|doi=10.1177/1461444811410394|s2cid=206727217}}</ref> According to Lisa Nakamura, representation in video games has become a problem, as the minority of players from different backgrounds who are not just the stereotyped white teen male gamer are not represented.<ref name=":03">{{Cite book |last=Nakamura |first=Lisa |date=2013-09-13 |title=Cybertypes |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203699188 |doi=10.4324/9780203699188|isbn=9780203699188 }}</ref>

[[Virtual world]]s are the most interactive of all virtual community forms. In this type of virtual community, people are connected by living as an [[avatar (computing)|avatar]] in a computer-based world. Users create their own avatar character (from choosing the avatar's outfits to designing the avatar's house) and control their character's life and interactions with other characters in the 3D virtual world. It is similar to a computer game,; however, there is no objective for the players. A virtual world simply gives users the opportunity to build and operate a fantasy life in the virtual realm. Characters within the world can talk to one another and have almost the same interactions people would have in reality. For example, characters can socialize with one another and hold intimate relationships online.

This type of virtual community allows for people to not only hold conversations with others in real time, but also to engage and interact with others. The avatars that users create are like humans. Users can choose to make avatars like themselves, or take on an entirely different personality than them. When characters interact with other characters, they can get to know one another through text-based talking and virtual experience (such as having avatars go on a date in the virtual world). A virtual community chat room may give real-time conversations, but people can only talk to one another. In a virtual world, characters can do activities together, just like friends could do in reality. Communities in virtual worlds are most similar to real-life communities because the characters are physically in the same place, even if the users who are operating the characters are not.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://hevra.haifa.ac.il/~soc/lecturers/talmud/files/547.htm |title=Virtuality and Its Discontents. |author=Turkle, Sherry |date=11 July 2010 |work=The American Prospect |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100726150252/http://hevra.haifa.ac.il/~soc/lecturers/talmud/files/547.htm |archive-date=26 July 2010 |url-status=dead |df=dmy-all }}</ref> ''[[Second Life]]'' is one of the most popular virtual worlds on the Internet. [[Whyville]] offers a goodan alternative for younger audiences where safety and privacy are a concern. In Whyville, youplayers use the virtual world's simulation aspect to experiment and learn about various phenomena.

Another use for virtual worlds has been in business communications. Benefits from virtual world technology such as photo realistic avatars and positional sound create an atmosphere for participants that provides a less fatiguing sense of presence. Enterprise controls that allow the meeting host to dictate the permissions of the attendees such as who can speak, or who can move about allow the host to control the meeting environment. [[Zoom (software)|Zoom]], is a popular platform that has grown over the [[COVID-19 pandemic]]. Where those who host meetings on this platform, can dictate who can or cannot speak, by muting or unmuting them, along with who is able to join. Several companies are creating business based virtual worlds including [[''Second Life]]''. These business based worlds have stricter controls and allow functionality such as muting individual participants, desktop sharing, or access lists to provide a highly interactive and controlled virtual world to a specific business or group. Business based virtual worlds also may provide various enterprise features such as Single Sign on with third party providers, or Content Encryption.{{Citation needed|date=February 2023}}

[[Howard Rheingold]]'s ''Virtual Community'' could be compared with [[Mark Granovetter]]'s ground-breaking "strength of weak ties" article published twenty years earlier in the ''[[American Journal of Sociology]]''. Rheingold translated, practiced and published Granovetter's conjectures about strong and weak ties in the online world. His comment on the first page even illustrates the social networks in the virtual society: "My seven year old daughter knows that her father congregates with a family of invisible friends who seem to gather in his computer. Sometimes he talks to them, even if nobody else can see them. And she knows that these invisible friends sometimes show up in the flesh, materializing from the next block or the other side of the world." (page 1). Indeed, in his revised version of ''Virtual Community'', Rheingold goes so far to say that had he read [[Barry Wellman]]'s work earlier, he would have called his book "online [[social network]]s".

Rheingold's definition contains the terms "social aggregation and personal relationships" (pp3). Lipnack &and Stamps (1997)<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Virtual teams : reaching across space, time, and organizations with technology|last=Jessica.|first=Lipnack|date=1997|publisher=Wiley|others=Stamps, Jeffrey.|isbn=978-0471165538|location=New York|oclc=36138326|url=https://archive.org/details/virtualteamsreac00lipn}}</ref> and Mowshowitz (1997) point out how virtual communities can work across space, time and organizational boundaries; Lipnack &and Stamps (1997)<ref name=":0" /> mention a common purpose; and Lee, Eom, Jung and Kim (2004) introduce "desocialization" which means that there is less frequent interaction with humans in traditional settings, e.g. an increase in virtual socialization. Calhoun (1991) presents a [[dystopia]] argument, asserting the impersonality of virtual networks. He argues that IT has a negative influence on offline interaction between individuals because virtual life takes over our lives. He believes that it also creates different personalities in people which can cause frictions in offline and online communities and groups and in personal contacts. (Wellman & Haythornthwaite, 2002). Recently, Mitch Parsell (2008) has suggested that virtual communities, particularly those that leverage Web 2.0 resources, can be pernicious by leading to attitude polarization, increased prejudices and enabling sick individuals to deliberately indulge in their diseases.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Pernicious virtual communities: Identity, polarisation and the Web 2.0 |author=Parsell, M. (2008) |journal=Ethics and Information Technology |volume=10 |page=Volume 10, Number 1: 41–56 |doi=10.1007/s10676-008-9153-y |year=2008 |s2cid=33207414 }}</ref>

In theory, online identities can be kept anonymous which enables people to use the virtual community for fantasy role playing as in the case of ''[[Second Life]]''{{'}}s use of avatars. Some professionals urge caution with users who use online communities because predators also frequent these communities looking for victims who are vulnerable to online [[identity theft]] or [[online predator]]s.<ref>{{cite web |last=Foster |first=D. |date=18 December 2000 |title=Community and identity in the electronic village |url=http://services.exeter.ac.uk/cmit/media/texts/porter1996/foster1996_community_and_identity/ |access-date=15 October 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110117045700/http://services.exeter.ac.uk/cmit/media/texts/porter1996/foster1996_community_and_identity/ |archive-date=17 January 2011 |url-status=dead |df=dmy-all }}</ref>