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Research

Research

Research

Papa Boney in VR

Papa Boney is a small Virtual Reality content creator, typically covering Vr news, and discussing hot topics in the VR Sphere, he has increased in popularity due to a video of his realeased on April 5th 2022, titled 'How I'm Overcoming My Social Anxiety in VRChat', in this video he talks about how in the real world he is quite an outgoing person, however when it comes to social VR spaces, like VrChat, for some reason he feels shy, he stated it was because he thought he would be bothering people and felt like a nuisance.

Papa Boney is a small Virtual Reality content creator, typically covering Vr news, and discussing hot topics in the VR Sphere, he has increased in popularity due to a video of his realeased on April 5th 2022, titled 'How I'm Overcoming My Social Anxiety in VRChat', in this video he talks about how in the real world he is quite an outgoing person, however when it comes to social VR spaces, like VrChat, for some reason he feels shy, he stated it was because he thought he would be bothering people and felt like a nuisance.

Papa Boney is a small Virtual Reality content creator, typically covering Vr news, and discussing hot topics in the VR Sphere, he has increased in popularity due to a video of his realeased on April 5th 2022, titled 'How I'm Overcoming My Social Anxiety in VRChat', in this video he talks about how in the real world he is quite an outgoing person, however when it comes to social VR spaces, like VrChat, for some reason he feels shy, he stated it was because he thought he would be bothering people and felt like a nuisance.

Papa Boney is a small Virtual Reality content creator, typically covering Vr news, and discussing hot topics in the VR Sphere, he has increased in popularity due to a video of his realeased on April 5th 2022, titled 'How I'm Overcoming My Social Anxiety in VRChat', in this video he talks about how in the real world he is quite an outgoing person, however when it comes to social VR spaces, like VrChat, for some reason he feels shy, he stated it was because he thought he would be bothering people and felt like a nuisance.

Papa Boney is a small Virtual Reality content creator, typically covering Vr news, and discussing hot topics in the VR Sphere, he has increased in popularity due to a video of his realeased on April 5th 2022, titled 'How I'm Overcoming My Social Anxiety in VRChat', in this video he talks about how in the real world he is quite an outgoing person, however when it comes to social VR spaces, like VrChat, for some reason he feels shy, he stated it was because he thought he would be bothering people and felt like a nuisance.

He entered a world within VrChat, full of drinking games for users to take part in, the reasoning behind this is, if a user is drunk they would be less likely to remember them, so if he were to embarrass himself, he would have to worry.

His experience in this room was uneventful, trying to talk to a few users however not getting any responses.

He switched to a world called 'Murder', a murder mystery world, with the players trying to figure out who among them is the murderer. Bones stated to enjoy this world much more, and said Murder is where he spent the rest of his night playing, talking to many of the users who come and go through the night. One user specifically he said he had a great time with, and seemed to easy his anxiety.

Bones went on to say that something that made his experience easier was having something in common with the other players, in this instance it was the murder mystery, allowing him to talk to them more comfortably.

At the end of the video Bones stated he wasn't where he wanted to be, but it was a step in the right direction.

This is an instance where a short period of time can dramatically help someone who suffers with social anxiety.

Whilst bones was in the drinking world, he was visibly more timid and nervous - whereas after he spent roughly 3/4 hours in Murder, he found talking to other users much easier, and could be seen to have his mic muted far less.

However, when the majority of the world's countries went into lockdown due to Covid-19, players flocked to VR chat in order to rekindle the social connection that many had been lacking for some time.

Social VR games like Vr Chat rose to popularity in early 2017 due to an explosion of twitch streamers playing the game, causing the average viewer count to rise from 5,000 viewers per week in January 2017 to nearly 70,000 viewers per week in March 2017. This, however, did not last long, with the following months view counts dropping to an average of 15,000 per week, but did slowly continue to rise over the following year.

However, when the majority of the world's countries went into lockdown due to Covid-19, players flocked to VR chat in order to rekindle the social connection that many had been lacking for some time.

Vr chat reached an all-time high in December 2021, most likely due to many gamers receiving a VR headset for Christmas, as well as the prolonged period of time spent in lockdown, which prevented many individuals from seeing their relatives during the Christmas period, attracting them to VR chat to socialise with other people.

VR Chat includes a plethora of user-generated content, ranging from games to in-game avatars - users can explore a recreation of their favorite video game world or a real-world area. They can visit game worlds where they can play paintball, table tennis, karaoke, and other activities. Furthermore, people could enter into VR chat and appear as whatever avatar they choose, such as Kermit the Frog, Iron Man, or Master Chief, or you could commission and custom avatar, produced by another user, something unique to you, that you could transfer over to other platforms and play as in other games.
This is where the attractiveness of VR chat stems from; you can look like whatever you want, regardless of your age, gender, or sexual orientation.

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