research-article

Gender- and Age-related Differences in Designing the Characteristics of Stereotypical Virtual Faces

Authors:

Valentin Schwind,

Niels HenzeAuthors Info & Claims

CHI PLAY '18: Proceedings of the 2018 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play

Pages 463 - 475

https://doi.org/10.1145/3242671.3242692

Published: 23 October 2018 Publication History

Abstract

The characteristics of virtual faces can be important factors for avatars and characters in video games. Previous work investigates how users create their own avatars and determines the generally preferred characteristics of virtual faces. However, it is currently unknown how the preferred characteristics of avatar faces depend on the players' age and gender or if these demographics can be predicted based on the data provided by an avatar creation system. In this paper, we investigate the effects of gender and age on the facial characteristics of 4,215 virtual faces created by 1,475 participants (994 male, 481 female) mainly from Central Europe using a web-based avatar creation system and the Caucasian average face. Our results show that with increasing age, men and women design increasingly realistic and less stylized avatars. We also found that young persons design more androgynous avatars, while adults further increase the masculinity and femininity of their avatars. However, women with higher age decrease the femininity and increase the masculinity of stereotypical faces. Based on the data collected during the avatar creation process, we can predict the participants' gender with an accuracy up to 91%, which open up new use cases for video games and avatar creation systems. We discuss potential social, biological, and cognitive explanations for our results and contribute with design implications for games and future avatar customization systems.

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Cited By

Li QZhang JLiu D(2024)Research on the Generative LoRa Model for Enhancing the Attractiveness of Virtual Human Facial FeaturesApplied Mathematics and Nonlinear Sciences10.2478/amns-2024-34229:1Online publication date: 22-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.2478/amns-2024-3422
Do TProtko CMcMahan R(2024)The Influence of Mixed-Gender Avatar Facial Features on Racial Perception: Insights from the VALID Avatar Library2024 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (VRW)10.1109/VRW62533.2024.00088(450-453)Online publication date: 16-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/VRW62533.2024.00088
Mikhailova VGerhardt CKunert CSchwandt TWeidner FBroll WDöring N(2024)Age and Realism of Avatars in Simulated Augmented Reality: Experimental Evaluation of Anticipated User Experience2024 IEEE Conference Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR)10.1109/VR58804.2024.00032(83-93)Online publication date: 16-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/VR58804.2024.00032
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Index Terms

Gender- and Age-related Differences in Designing the Characteristics of Stereotypical Virtual Faces
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Human computer interaction (HCI)
    1. HCI design and evaluation methods
2. Social and professional topics
  1. User characteristics

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cover image ACM Conferences

CHI PLAY '18: Proceedings of the 2018 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play

October 2018

563 pages

ISBN:9781450356244

DOI:10.1145/3242671

General Chairs:
Florian 'Floyd' Mueller
Exertion Games Lab, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
,
Daniel Johnson
Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia
,
Ben Schouten
Eindhoven University of Technology and Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, the Netherlands
,
Program Chairs:
Phoebe O. Toups Dugas
Play & Interactive Experiences for Learning Lab, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico, USA
,
Peta Wyeth
Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia

Copyright © 2018 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Published: 23 October 2018

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Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
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Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst Baden-Württemberg

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CHI PLAY '18: The annual symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play

October 28 - 31, 2018

VIC, Melbourne, Australia

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CHI PLAY '18 Paper Acceptance Rate 43 of 123 submissions, 35%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 421 of 1,386 submissions, 30%

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Cited By

Li QZhang JLiu D(2024)Research on the Generative LoRa Model for Enhancing the Attractiveness of Virtual Human Facial FeaturesApplied Mathematics and Nonlinear Sciences10.2478/amns-2024-34229:1Online publication date: 22-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.2478/amns-2024-3422
Do TProtko CMcMahan R(2024)The Influence of Mixed-Gender Avatar Facial Features on Racial Perception: Insights from the VALID Avatar Library2024 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (VRW)10.1109/VRW62533.2024.00088(450-453)Online publication date: 16-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/VRW62533.2024.00088
Mikhailova VGerhardt CKunert CSchwandt TWeidner FBroll WDöring N(2024)Age and Realism of Avatars in Simulated Augmented Reality: Experimental Evaluation of Anticipated User Experience2024 IEEE Conference Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR)10.1109/VR58804.2024.00032(83-93)Online publication date: 16-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/VR58804.2024.00032
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