LA Times Features Anthropologist's US Government-Funded Study of How Virtual Worlds Affect Disabled Users

Good LA Times write-up of Tom Boellstorff, the UC Irvine Anthropology professor who's been exploring Second Life since 2004 (and full disclosure, became an IRL pal along the way). The Times' focus is on Tom's latest work, which is funded by the US government, and focuses on the many disabled people who use virtual worlds like Second Life:

Boellstorff and co-researcher Donna Davis of the University of Oregon got to know about 200 disabled players. The researchers found the virtual world provides a way for the mentally and physically disabled to socialize and forge meaningful relationships. “We so often hear about the dark side of technology,” Davis said. “But I think that Tom and I have found that there is a bright side. People can connect in these virtual spaces in really important and meaningful ways.”

Boellstorff’ has received $277,000 in funding from the National Science Foundation since 2015 to research how online environments affect social interaction, self-awareness and the disabled experience. Boellstorff, who is writing a second book on his new research, hopes that his research will cause technology developers to pay heed to the issues of disabled people when creating virtual reality products.

“This is an important thing for these CEOs to look at,” Boellstorff said. “Over and over again, if you look at the history of technology, often the tech gets developed assuming the consumer is able-bodied."

Well said. Much more on the LA Times site here. Tom's work, of course, has been featured on NWN many times, including:

• "This Is Who I Am": Why A Woman With Parkinson’s Sees Both Her SL Avatar & Her Physical Body As Real (Excerpt, Coming Of Age In Second Life)
• If Second Life Is A Game, Then Everything Is A Game: Virtual Worlds Academic Tom Boellstorff Weighs In
• "Trump Won Because He Understood The Digital Is Real" - Top Anthropologist On How To Study The President-Elect's Online Following

Comments

[Tom Boellstorff]

Thanks for the shoutout!

[Clara Seller]

I just watched a delightful GEEcast interview with Mr. Boellstorff on YouTube.

It's nice to get another perspective on virtual worlds beside the "tech" one.

It makes me wonder if places like SL wouldn't be better served with upper management that has broader expertise, vision, and sensitivity outside of the tech bubble. A virtual world is more than just the nuts and bolts.

Tom Boellstorff comes off as more enthusiastic and enlightened about SL potential and success, than the person who runs it. That's frustrating.

[Alejandro]

I am a sociologist and I have been in SL for about 7 years and I have detected exactly the same, I have and had some friends who at some point they told me about a health problem that does not allow them to have a normal life and this surprised me. Of all those life stories there are some people who even got to say goodbye because they had an advanced cancer and they did not reconnect again.

Of all these stories I've had in the 7 years in SL, the one that most impacts me is someone I remember as "fairy". About 2 years ago I met a sweet lady in an accident she lost two legs, one arm, one eye and can only speak with a voice device. She is a fairy in a forest designed to delve into the history she has created in her forest. It is a beautiful place where you can feel peace. When I started chatting with her we immediately made a connection and after some time of conversation she told me her story and it is difficult for her to leave the house, she only goes to the doctor, some shopping and eventually goes to a park. As a sociologist I did a mental exercise made by Max Webber where we divest our values, thoughts and perspective that every human being makes of ourselves with our own life experience and I enter in her perspective. Imagine having a life that you can not frequently see someone, without talking to anyone... thanks to second life these people can have a human contact, socialize, smile, create, fascinate others and touch our lives. On one occasion I wrote to Ebbe Altberg about this and received a pleasant response thanking me for this information. In fact, those who know the history of "Ivory Tower Library of Primitives" is a sample of this. In my experience Second Life is more useful to society than many people believe, we could even be talking about social responsibility.

I hope that Second Life has more years of life because I do not know how it would be for these people to start a second life for the third time if they have to move to another virtual world.

[Tom Boellstorff]

Lovely post, Alejandro! We have indeed known not just for 10 years but before SL that virtual worlds can have all kinds of possibilities for disability, and every new story has something to offer. This is a wonderful one! Thanks for sharing it, Alejandro. And very true, James, that the interface can make access more of an issue than it should be for disabled folks (and the VR is not making this easier so far).