Figure 1.
Propensity to cover skin among virtual males and females.
Shown is the percentage of Second Life male and female avatars in relation to the percentage of covered skin.
Figure 2.
Degree of skin disclosure among virtual males and females.
Shown is the percentage of exposed naked skin among male and female avatars in relation to the area of the entire body and of the body excluding the head and hands. Female avatars revealed twice as much naked skin as male avatars (A) and this difference was even more pronounced when sheer skin covering was considered (B). Results are presented as means ± SEM. ***p<0.001.
Figure 3.
Contribution of users’ sex to skin disclosure among male and female avatars.
Potential sex swapping among users was accounted for by excluding the top 25% of female avatars that exposed most skin and the bottom 25% of male avatars that exposed least skin. Even after excluding these avatars, the remaining female avatars revealed significantly more skin than remaining male avatars. Results are presented as means ± SEM. ***p<0.001.
Figure 4.
Contribution of sexualized portrayal of body shape to skin disclosure.
Shown is the percentage of naked skin disclosed by male (A) and female (B) avatars as a function of body proportions related to sexual attractiveness (frontal shoulder:hip ratio in males, frontal waist:chest ratio in females). Spearman correlation analyses revealed no significant relationship between body proportions and the percentage of exposed naked skin, indicating that virtual skin disclosure is independent of any hypersexualization of avatar body shapes.
Table 1.
Results of Spearman correlation analyses of the percentage of exposed naked skin and sexually dimorphic body proportions.
Figure 5.
Influence of explicit cultural norms on virtual skin disclosure.
Shown is the percentage of exposed skin in relation to the area of the entire body (A) and of the body excluding the head and hands (B) for avatars from the “Star Wars” role-play community and characters from the “Star Wars” movies. There was no difference between male avatars and movie characters, but female avatars revealed substantially more naked skin than female movie characters, despite being in a culturally constrained virtual setting. Results are presented as means ± SEM. ***p<0.001.