[Studies of Human Communication in Real and Virtual Environments Planning]

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would first like to express my gratitude for my research supervisor, colleagues, and peers and family whose immense and constant support has been a source of continuous guidance and inspiration.

DECLARATION

I [type your full first names & surname here], declare that the following dissertation/thesis and its entire content has been an individual, unaided effort and has not been submitted or published before. Furthermore, it reflects my opinion and take on the topic and is does not represent the opinion of the University.

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Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION1

Background1

Rationale1

Aims and Objectives2

Research Questions2

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW4

Types of Communication4

The Systemic Theory of Communication4

The Foundations of Systems Theory Communication5

Axioms of Communication6

The Impossibility of Not Communicating7

Levels of Content and Relationship Communication8

The Score of the Sequence of Events9

Circularity of the Patterns of Communication11

The Symbolic Universe and Digital Communication12

The Four Major Modalities of Digital Language13

Communications Equipment in a Virtual World14

Virtual Communication15

Function and Relationship: Essence of Perception16

Virtual Worlds Defined17

Avatars Defined19

Communications in Second Life20

Education and Science in Second Life21

Science Communication Projects in Second Life22

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY24

Research Design24

Literature Search25

Keywords26

CHAPTER 4: DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS27

Studies on Human Communication28

Studies of Communication33

Communication in the Virtual Environment37

Humans communicate in the real environment38

Social Virtual Worlds39

Humans interacting socially with Media39

Human mediated and machine interaction and technologies41

Obstacles in the Virtual Environment42

Second life Education and Science43

Need for Autonomous Virtual Humans44

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION47

REFERENCES48

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

Background

Communication helps human being to interact with others. Humans communicate in the real environments via language, speech, and sometimes through non oral communication. Human beings also start interacting with the virtual environment. While the future of this particular virtual world remains unseen, virtual worlds as a whole will almost certainly continue to thrive. Long before the Internet existed, computer scientists working at Stanford, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Essex University in the United Kingdom used virtual worlds to communicate with each other over the Internet's predecessor, ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network). During the late 1970s, these early virtual worlds were utterly text-based, functionally primitive, and only accessible to a handful of privileged individuals. Today, virtual worlds are accessible to anyone with a computer and a standard Internet connection, and they possess the graphical and functional capabilities to facilitate worldwide scientific communication, collaboration, and instruction.

Rationale

In fact, a multitude of high school teachers, university professors, scientists, and public intellectuals now use three-dimensional (3-D) virtual worlds to communicate the principles of their disciplines. When asked to describe their experience with virtual worlds, many of these professionals say that virtual world environments such as Second Life are nothing short of astounding, that virtual worlds are the wave of the future. To put it simply, many in the scientific community now believe that virtual worlds will become one of the major tools for global scientific communication and instruction in the 21st century. Today's science communicators will need to understand what exactly a modern virtual world is how individuals enter into and communicate in virtual worlds, and finally, the role that the arts and sciences have come to play in the development ...