Examining Gender, Race and Body Image in a Virtual World

In this assignment we had to go onto Second Life a virtual world and try to socialize with complete strangers. We had to use the avatar that we choose and then after thirty minutes change the avatar by either its race, gender, or physical appearance. I found that when I was just a white male that it was very difficult to talk to others. People were really not being to friendly on Second Life as well. I noticed then when I switched to a woman that I was approached several times and people started to talk to me. Then I changed it to a black female and same response I was getting more people responding to my chats and they were coming to me saying "hi".

I also noticed that it really depends what world you are on. when i was on these random worlds for example the UK world there really was nothing going on there. Then I moved to a world that had a new members theme and thee people were talking and being very friendly. So the world that you choose to be in also matter on how people interact with you.

Here in this screenshot is when I was a white male and i started to talk to these two girls. 

Here I am still a white male and there were new people coming into the world talking to me. 

In this screenshot I changed my avatar to a white female and there I got more responses without even saying anything. 

Here I am talking to some random girl that I encountered in this world. 

In this screenshot I switched my avatar to a black female and there i got approached right away and started a conversation. 

Here is a screenshot of me conversing with someone who I became friends with real quickly. This world I found was much more friendlier. 

This is me going into Second Life and changing my "identity " for my avatar and socializing with others. It is a final exercise from the Immersive Education course that I am taking at Boston College. The course is called Discovering Computer Graphics. For details, visit the immersive BC portal at http://ImmersiveEducation.org/@/bc