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Shiqi Deng

User Experience Design MSc

I'm a passionate UX Design student with a keen eye for detail and a deep curiosity in design thinking and human interaction, allowing me to approach problems with empathy and creativity.

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Research Introduction

This study examined how avatar similarity and perceived risk in VR affect college students’ social confidence and found that high-similarity and low-risk environments enhanced confidence most significantly, suggesting that VR design should balance avatar similarity and the perceived risk.

In this study, participants will complete five sessions: one control group (face-to-face interaction) and four experimental groups (high/low avatar similarity × high/low perceived risk). After each session, their social confidence will be measured using SPSS to examine how avatar similarity and perceived risk influence social confidence in VR.
In the low-risk scenario, the study uses the Wizard of Oz approach: the AI voice assistant CiCi provides continuous positive feedback and engages participants in a friendly manner, while the experimenter controls the avatar’s movements to enhance realism.

Before joining the experimental groups, participants first complete the control condition—face-to-face interaction—to establish baseline data on social confidence for comparison with the VR sessions.

Research Process

Research Background
Research Background
Research Questions
Research Significance
An avatar selection lobby was designed to allow participants to choose avatars according to the experimental requirements.
Based on the preliminary survey, college students identified the campus square as their most frequent and familiar social space, so it was selected as the outdoor social setting in the study.
Prototype testing revealed that outdoor group conversations created distracting noise. To address this, two indoor social settings—the student union and the classroom building—were added for participants to explore.

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