CM Seminar – “The ‘Social’ Side of Social Virtual Reality”

Presented by: Bree McEwan

Description: One of the potential use cases of virtual reality is to create spaces where humans can interact with each other or virtual agents across distances. However, despite many of the technological challenges of social VR being solved, social VR does not see poised for widespread adoption. Multi-user social VR needs to be perceived not just as a technology to be solved but an emerging communication channel. Social science approaches, particularly from communication scholars, are needed to truly understand the way that humans engage with VR and each other in these new environments. McEwan’s talk will outline a program of research using qualitative and quantitative approaches to understand communication processes, effects, and user perceptions of VR design to deepen our understanding of how people engage with environments and each other in social VR.

Bio: Bree McEwan is a Professor in the Institute of Communication, Culture, Information and Technology, an associate director of the Data Sciences Institute, and a faculty affiliate of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society at the University of Toronto. She is a co- organizer and founder of the Questioning Reality conference, a social VR research incubator. McEwan authored Navigating New Media Networks and co-authored Interpersonal Encounters. She directs the McEwan Mediated Communication Lab which researches the intersection of technology and social interaction. McEwan has published on relational maintenance on social network sites, perceived social affordances of communication channels, linguistic patterns in online communities, and the diffusion of information through social media. In addition, McEwan has metascience interests focused on transparency and replication in the social sciences. Current studies of the McMC Lab focus on affordances of social virtual environments, cognition and heuristics related to learning in VR spaces, and nonverbal communication patterns of avatars and agents.

Hosted by: Professor Katherine Isbister

When: Monday, February 9, 2026 from 12:30PM to 1:30PM

Location: 

IN-PERSON @ UCSC Main Campus, E2-280.

Viewing room @ SVC 3212.  

LUNCH WILL BE PROVIDED AT BOTH LOCATIONS! Faculty and students are highly encouraged to attend.

Zoom info:

https://ucsc.zoom.us/j/91469785121?pwd=F0jplMgh4eTjy6qNZI0lEhlljs0XhG.1

Meeting ID: 914 6978 5121
Passcode: 183098