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Consent, Deception, and Retaliation: Articulating What it Means to Feel Safe in Social Cross-Reality with Participatory Design of VR Dating

Tebbe, Devin and Burger, Braeden and Kind, Toby and Zytko, Douglas (2024) — Companion Publication of the 2024 Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing

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DOI: 10.1145/3678884.3681915 (opens in a new tab)

Country:   United States
Tags:   Bystander Intervention, Catfishing, Cross Reality Safety, Identity Deception, Participatory Design, Sexual Consent, Social Virtual Reality, Vr Dating
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Synopsis

            
This publication reports a participatory design study exploring safety in cross-reality dating experiences that blend virtual reality with real-world interactions. The researchers aim to articulate what a sense of safety would require as dating moves across the virtual-to-physical continuum, not to catalog actual harms, but to forecast design directions that could mitigate feared risks and foster broader and safer adoption of cross-realities. The study centers on stakeholders who identify as women and/or LGBTQIA+, drawing on their prior experiences with mobile dating and social VR to imagine safety requirements for VR dating across realities. The methodology involved four in-person design sessions with 16 participants, organized to share personal experiences, articulate safety concerns, and generate scenario-based design ideas. Through reflexive thematic analysis of transcripts and artifacts, the authors identify three cross-reality harm categories participants found most salient: physical harm as retaliation for romantic rejection after crossing realities; unintentional physical harms stemming from assumed or trivialized consent when transitioning from VR to the physical world; and sexual predation or exploitation arising from misinformed or deceptive representations of self across realities. These harms were framed as design challenges rather than verified incident counts. From these insights, the authors propose three long-term design goals to promote safety: (1) explicit visualization or conveyance of consent for interpersonal behaviors across realities; (2) cross-reality bystander intervention networks that involve staff or trained observers in physical-world locations; and (3) cross-reality buddy systems pairing daters with supporters to monitor safety during first face-to-face meetings. The paper discusses future work, noting the need for larger, more diverse samples and empirical validation of proposed safety mechanisms.

          

        
                  

            
Identified Gaps

            
The paper identifies limited research on cross-reality safety and harm, as prior work generally treats VR and AR harms separately. It notes that functional AR/VR consent-mechanic prototypes have not yet been produced and assessed. Empirical knowledge is also lacking on which harms actually occur in cross-reality dating, their long-term impacts, and the accuracy of participants' anticipated harms.

          

        
                  

            
Methods

            
The study used participatory-design workshops with 16 prospective VR-dating users in the U.S. Midwest who identified as women and/or LGBTQIA+. Four groups completed three 3-hour sessions; this paper analyzes the first session on safety visions and anticipated VR-dating risks. Participants mapped harms across a virtual-to-physical continuum, discussed concerns, and generated scenarios and design ideas. Researchers conducted reflexive thematic analysis of transcripts and participant-created visual artifacts.

          

        
                  

            
Limitations

            
Findings are anticipatory design insights rather than evidence that the forecasted harms occur or estimates of their prevalence. The sample was small (16), geographically limited to the U.S. Midwest, and restricted to women and LGBTQIA+ prospective users, with limited ethnic diversity. The paper reports only the first of three workshop sessions. Participants generally had dating-app and/or social-VR experience, but not necessarily VR-dating-app experience.

          

        
                  

            
Future Work

            
Co-design and evaluate functional AR/VR consent-mechanic prototypes. Develop safety technologies that support physically co-located or virtual bystander intervention. Use larger and more demographically diverse samples, including cisgender men and broader ethnic representation. As VR dating gains users, empirically examine which cross-reality harms occur, their long-term impacts, and whether proposed safety measures work.

          

              

    
    

        
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