Avatars, characters, multiple identities: observations on dissociative processes

People in virtual worlds like Second Life form complex relationships with their avatars, simultaneously feeling identification and distance, truth and pretense. The genuine emotions experienced through avatars raise paradoxical questions about authenticity—players cannot pretend to feel unless they are pretending to pretend—and about who actually experiences those feelings, the avatar or the player. Shifting between identities challenges the consistency and continuity of the self. The analysis draws parallels between these virtual experiences and possession phenomena or out-of-body travel in traditional societies, informed by scientific literature on multiple identity and dissociation.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This paper looks into the implications of avatarization regarding self-construction and self-presentation, based on personal experiences and observations conducted in a virtual world (Second Life), observations and conversations with other gamers, and an exploration of the paradoxes at play in participants’ relationships to their avatars, as well as in their relationship to other players and their avatars, which simultaneously conjure up notions of identification and distance, truth and pretense, “real” and “substitute” relationships. Our analysis first focuses on the emotions and feelings experienced through persistent-world avatars or video-game characters, drawing distinctions between the different types of involvement likely to bind individuals to their virtual stand-ins. The genuine experience of emotions and feelings raises the paradoxical question of their authenticity (a player cannot pretend to be experiencing such feelings—unless they are pretending to pretend). It simultaneously raises the question of who is experiencing these feelings: the avatar (the character) or the player? The ability to shift from one identity to another ultimately raises the abysmal question of self-continuity across multiple identities, and of the consistency of this “self.” This discussion will be informed by an exploration of the phenomenon of multiple identity and of the notion of dissociation in contemporary scientific literature, as we draw a parallel with possession phenomena and out-of-body travel in traditional societies.