How Visualising Emotions Affects Interpersonal Trust and Task Collaboration in a Shared Virtual Space
Allison Jing, Michael Frederick, Monica Sewell, Amy Karlson, Brian D. Simpson, Missie Smith
Abstract
Emotion is dynamic. Changes in emotion can be hard to process during face-to-face interaction, yet transferring them into a shared virtual space becomes more challenging. This research first explores nine visual representations to amplify emotions in a virtual space, leading to a bi-directional emotion-sharing system (FeelMoji i/o). The second study investigates the effect of explicit emotion-sharing in interpersonal trust and task collaboration through three conditions - verbal only, verbal+positive visual, and verbal+honest visual using FeelMoji through the proposal of a framework of four factors (usability, integrity, behaviour, and collaboration). The results indicate that FeelMoji yields frequent emotion consensus as task milestones and positive interdependent behaviours between collaborators, which help develop conversations, affirm decision-making, and build familiarity and trust between strangers. Moreover, we discuss how our study can inspire future investigation in human-AI agent behaviours and large-scale multi-user virtual environments.