Realism and Naturalness: A Potential Model for Understanding Physical and Social Presence

Presence: “there” even when you’re not Physical presence a sense of “being there” an “illusion of non-mediation” Social presence a sense of “being with others” a sense of inclusion in a group

Presence: “there” even when you’re not Physical presence—VR, VE, and SVE a sense of “being there” an “illusion of non-mediation” Social presence—text-based OE a sense of “being with others” a sense of inclusion in a group

Presence: “there” even when you’re not Physical presence—VR, VE, and SVE a sense of “being there”: immersion an “illusion of non-mediation”: transparency Social presence—text-based OE a sense of “being with others” a sense of inclusion in a group

Presence: “there” even when you’re not Physical presence—VR, VE, and SVE a sense of “being there”: immersion an “illusion of non-mediation”: transparency Social presence—text-based OE a sense of “being with others”: copresence a sense of inclusion in a group: immediacy

Presence: “there” even when you’re not Physical presence Immersion: Realism Transparency: Naturalness Social presence Copresence: Realism Immediacy: Naturalness

Physical and Social Presence Survey Initial Instrument Physical Presence: 6 items Social Presence: 7 items Interaction: 6 items Administered to 30 doctoral students in text-based online ed. research course

Physical and Social Presence Survey Reliability: Cronbach’s Alpha =.93 Factor analysis Four factors w/ Eigenvalues over 1 With three factors 8 items loaded in all 3 7 items loaded in 2 Only 2 items loaded in 1

Physical and Social Presence Survey Reliability: Cronbach’s Alpha =.93 Factor analysis Four factors w/ Eigenvalues over 1 With three factors 8 items loaded in all 3 7 items loaded in 2 Only 2 items loaded in 1 Content analysis: Presence in general

Physical and Social Presence Survey Revised instrument Replaced the 2 general presence items and 1 other item that loaded across all 3 factors 3 new questions addressed immersion and transparency (awareness of real world, engagement of senses, and “going into” the OE). Administered to 43 respondents in undergraduate writing course and graduate CECS courses

Results Reliability: Cronbach’s Alpha =.884 Factor Analysis 4 items loaded as physical presence 5 items loaded as social presence 5 items loaded in both factors These 9 items were on both surveys

Results of Combined Datasets Reliability: Cronbach’s Alpha =.843 Factor analysis: Only 2 factors: 61% of variance 3 social presence items loaded in both factors Multi-dimensional Scaling (ALSCAL)

Conclusions A realism-naturalness model might work for both physical and social presence Reliable and valid instrument for both types of presence that can be used in a variety of online environments