*Instructions for this report* 

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

MUD Research:
    *The Journal of MUD Research website
    *Summary
    *In class questions and answers
    *My reaction to my presentation
    *Mine and Theirs (comparison of oral reports)
    *Suggestions for future generations

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*Here's a summary...

The Journal of MUD Research is an electronic journal that publishes academic research relating to MUDs or makes use of MUD environments. Interests are: psychological, anthropological, and sociological approaches to MUDding. On this page, there are links to journal articles that relate to MUD Research. You can browse through different volumes of hte journals and within these volumes there are different topics. Some of the topics contain only an abstract, and some have the entire journal article. I browsed through all of the journals and picked out the ones that interested me the most. This page is intended for those who are interested in the topic, researchers, professors, etc. The reading isn?t too difficult, but a general understanding of psychology, computers and the internet would be helpful. In the next few paragraphs, I will summarize some of the topics that I discussed in class. These topics were found in different volumes of the journal.

1. WHAT IS MUD? ( I found this information on this website: http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v2n1/sempsey.html)

  A MUD is a network-accessible, multi-participant, user-extensible virtual reality which is primarily text-based. The name "MUD" first appeared in 1978 when a student named Roy Trubshaw at the University of Essex, England. Roy created a program that he called a "Multi-User Dungeon" (Reid, 1994). It was a multi-user adventure game loosely based upon the popular game known as "Dungeons and Dragons". In this fantasy adventure, players were encouraged to compete with each other for points by going on quests to slay monsters or find treasure. All players started out on an equal footing, but after having accumulated a certain number of points a player could advance his rank, thus granting him access to new and greater powers. This eventually lead to a sort of social hierarchy which spanned from "Newbies" (new players) though various intermediate levels, and culminating in attainment of the title "Wizard".
To reflect this evolution, the acronym MUD has come to stand for Multi-User Dimension or Multi-User
Domain as well as the original Multi-User Dungeon. Additionally, the term MUD has differentiated into various sub-types such as MOO, MUSH, MUSE, MUCK, DUM, etc... There are various types of MUDs. MUD environments have been created to serve such diverse purposes and populations as: NASA/JPL astronomers (Astro-VR), biology researchers (BioMOO), K-12 student education (MicroMUSE), virtual university campus (DU-MOO), star trek fantasy role playing (TrekMUSE), literary and cultural theorists (PmcMOO), media researchers (MediaMOO) and hundreds of others. At present, the number of and potential uses for MUDs appears to be far from exhausted. Though exact statistics concerning the number of existing MUDs and MUD populations are unavailable, it is estimated that the current number of sites is between 300 and 500, with a population that seems to be growing exponentially.

1. DISINHIBITION - it appears to be generally accepted that individuals are less inhibited when interacting in MUDs than they might be in real life circumstances - It has been postulated that this phenomenon may be attributable to the lack of regulating social context cues (e.g. body language, tone of voice, etc..) and that the lack of such cues are read as an obscuring of the boundaries which delineate the forms of behavior which are deemed acceptable or unacceptable (Kiesler, Siegal,& McGuire, 1984). However, other researchers have attributed this phenomenon to such causes as real life anonymity
2. GENDER DIFFERENCES- Men and women behave differently. Women are four times more likely to initiate "whuggles" than men. Women are more affectionate towards other characters. . Men use more physically violent imagery.
3. GENDER SWAPPING ? It isn?t indicative of real-life homosexuality or transvestitism. Majority are men, they report their female characters prosper better, more helped.
4. MULTIPLE IDENTITIES ? In a MUD a player may "appear as one wishes"
5. MUD ADDICTION - People sometimes prefer their on-line lives that they actually begin to abandon their "real" lives, spending up to 18 hours per day living in virtual reality- INTERNET ADDICTION DISORDER. Support groups available. There have even been reports of Internet related deaths, such as cardiac arrests resulting from sleep deprivation and lack of personal maintenance or suicides due to Net related stress.
6. FRIENDLINESS ? People may be friendlier towards one another in cyberspace.

2. WHY STUDY MUDs?  (I found this information at http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v1n1/intro.html)

There are three broad approaches to studying MUDs:

a. Differences between MUDs and "real life" ? MUDs contain gender swapping, and multiple personalities. MUD players develop alternatives to conventional interactions.

b. MUDs as windows into real life - MUDs offer unprecedented opportunities for observation, manipulation, and control of relevant variables. For example, Schiano (1996) has used a MUD to help understand how the mind conceptualizes space. A MUD also offers unprecedented opportunities for research without informed consent, confidentiality, debriefing, or other procedures that are essential to the protection of human subjects. Researchers who study MUD players must carefully consider how to proceed ethically.

c. MUDs as themselves - Research on MUDs and their players can also be useful to the MUDs themselves!

My comments on this section: This section wasn?t too hard to read. Since it went into further detail and was more specific in its topic, I found it a little less easy to relate to since I am inexperienced in the MUD environment. I thought that this section was helpful to understanding what MUD research is about and why people study MUDs.

3. SOME FUTURE DIRECTIONS FOR MUD RESEARCH

(This was also found at http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v1n1/intro.html )
These are some areas of study which are particularly relevant to MUDs:
a. psychological theories of group behavior, altruism, aggression, spatial representation, and attention.
b. Sociological theories of organizational structure, social norms, and exchanges.
c. Organizational behavior work on training, management, leadership, satisfaction, turnover, job characteristics, and organizational citizenship.
d. Political science. Aspects of many MUDs can be understood in terms of political structures, coalitions, and mechanisms of governance.
e. Sociolinguistics, cognitive linguistics, and pragmatics. The language MUD players use has already received some attention
f. Anthropological theories of culture, ritual, and folklore. If the players of a MUD constitutes a subculture, with shared beliefs, understandings, rituals, etc., anthropology has much to offer.
g. Computer science work on distributed databases, graphical interfaces, virtual reality models, and client-server computing.

My comments on this section: I thought that this was a very interesting section. Many people can relate to this section because it shows how MUD research can be related to many other fields besides just psychology.

5. THE THERAPEUTIC POTENTIALS OF TEXT-BASED VIRTUAL REALITY

(Found at http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v3n2/sempsey.html)

This section is about therapeutic potential of MUDS. The proposition is put forth that MUDs may be well suited to the practice of on-line psychotherapy, or as adjuncts to face to face therapy, particularly for those that seek to incorporate group oriented methods of treatment. What this means is that MUDS can be used as therapy in itself or accompanied with a therapist. This section discusses three therapeutic models that tie into MUDS. These models are text (bibliotherapy), role play (psychodrama) and social interaction (T-Group.)

My comments on this section: I was specifically interested in this section because my first oral report was done on Turkle?s Chapter 4 ? which speaks of cybertherapy. This section added on to what I learned from Turkle?s text. It went into further detail on how MUDs can be used as therapy.

There are many more topics which I have not discussed. I chose to discuss those which were the most important to me and those in which most people can relate to the most. If you are still interesting in reading more about MUD Research, please visit this page. http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/

WHAT DID I LEARN FROM THIS SITE? I learned a lot from this site. This is the first time that I learned about MUDS and I feel confident that I could explain to any one about what a MUD is and what its uses are. I learned how MUDS can be related to different fields of study besides psychology, how MUDS can be used as therapy, different way people behave in a MUD, and what the future of MUDS may hold.

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*Your questions, my answers...

What does MUD stand for? (Wai Chong Pun) MUD stands for Multi-User Domain (or Dungeon). See above section on "What is MUD".

As technology advances, more fields within psychology are being created. In MUD Research, are the researchers (experts) specialized in a particular field such as social or cognitive? (Shehla Korff) From the journal articles that I did read from this site, it did seem that the researchers were specialized. Each article is written by a different researcher and the articles specialize in some aspect of MUD research. A majority of the articles dealt with behaviors in a MUD environment.

Who wrote the research that you found? In your research, did you try accessing any MUDS, if so, what different MUDS did you explore? (Jason Thompson) The site is made up of many different volumes of the journal articles, so there are many different authors. No, I did not get a chance to visit a MUD, but hopefully I?ll find the time sometime.

Do you see a social educational value to MUDing? Are there any negative effects? What makes them so popular? How does MUDing change the concept of "privacy"? (Dr. James) Yes, I do see a social educational value to MUDing. I think that through a MUD, a person can learn a lot about the world. In a MUD environment, you may have the opportunity to socialize with people from all over the world. They give you the opportunity to socialize with people that you may never get the chance to meet in "real life". Yes there are negative effects. In one of the journal articles (http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v2n1/sempsey.html) you can find a section on MUD addiction. This section mentions that people can become so addicted, that they enjoy their MUD life better than their "real" life, and sometimes abandon their "real" lives. This phenomenon is called Internet Addiction Disorder. Some may even suffer sleep deprivation and in return suffer internet related deaths such as cardiac arrests. Some suicides related to the internet have also been reported. I think that these are extreme cases, but definitely possible. I am not sure why MUDs are "so popular" I haven?t even heard about them before this class, so they can?t be that popular. There is a big number of users and different MUDs. They are probably popular because they are fun. People get drawn into them like kids to a new game. As far as how MUDing changes the concept of privacy, I am unsure because I have never tried a MUD before. I think that you could have all the privacy that you want because you can choose among different characters for yourself. I would assume that you can keep your personal information private and only reveal it to those whom you wish to share with.

Does the time on the net produce acute physical reactions that we are unaware of while MUDing? What are the extreme negative sides of MUDing? (Jayson Nakasone) I believe that the time on the net can produce physical reactions. I think that it could be like sitting and watching TV, if you do it for too long, you can get lazy, or you can gain weight from the lack of exercise. On the other hand it is different from watching TV because you are intellectually involved, you sit at a keyboard and type, you laugh, you think, you chat. You don?t just sit and stare at the monitor. See the previous question for the extreme negative sides of MUDing.

Do you think it is healthy in participating in MUDs? (Wing Kin Man) I think that there could be both positive and negative effects of MUDing. In the last two questions I explained the negative effects. As for the positive, I think that MUDing can be educational. You can learn to socialize, you can learn about other parts of the world (other cultures) by conversing with people in a MUD, you can use a MUD as therapy, you can make great friends, and best of all, you can learn to type really fast!

Is there a way to study how individuals from different cultures come together in a subculture and interact? (ie are minority women still at a disadvantage in MUDs or does anonymity erase this inequality?) (Synthia Lopez) I?m sure that there are ways to study this, however I read in one of the articles that doing studies on MUD groups can be difficult because of anonymity reasons, random sampling could be difficult, and also, you can never be positive about the real identity of the subjects. As for the minority women question, I think that the anonymity would probably change this. Maybe these women would like to try out having a male character who is the opposite of their real life persona. They may take on the characteristics of a dominant, rich male for example. I also read that men change identities to become women because they find that as a minority, women were offered help more often. Maybe the minority women may enjoy being a minority there. For information on Character Race and Multi-User Domains, see http://journal.tinymush.org/~jomr/v3n2/seidman.html.

I have been told to consider whatever I type or send over the internet as public info/open to public view. Can MUD interaction be considered to take place in a public place? If it can, then what ethical issues concerning MUD research exist? (Cindy Hisley) I think that there are both public and private rooms in the MUD environment. But just because a person is in a "private" room, they should still consider the fact that there probably are others out there who can be viewing what is going on in that room. I didn?t find too much about ethical issues in MUD research. I am not aware of what kind of privacy rights people have on the internet.

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*My Reactions to my presentation...

I thought that the presentation went well. I covered a few different aspects of MUDing and I felt that the other students were interested in some of the different topics. During the class discussion, we talked about how MUDing can help in the workplace. I commented on that, saying that I think that MUDing can get in the way of work in the work place, just like email can. Emailing for work purposes does have its advantages, so maybe MUDing can also somehow. We also talked about MUDing being virtual reality, even though virtual reality is usually audio and visual. There are different hardware and software programs for MUDs so that you can have both audio and visuals. I think that this could defeat some of the MUDing purposes such as imagery, role play and anonymity.

*Mine and Theirs (comparison of oral reports)

The majority of the students don't have their oral reports posted yet, so I don't have much to compare mine to. Of the ones that I did get to look at, they were not too different than mine. They are each broken up into sections similar to mine. I think that after looking at theirs, I realize that I could have kept mine a little shorter. My report is a lot longer and a bit more detailed than some that I took a look at.

*Suggestions for Future Generations:

Well, this assignment isn?t too hard, it is just very time consuming. Just be prepared by reading thoroughly. Make sure that you give yourself enough time to visit the site because if you wait until the last moment, you may find out that the site is a lot longer than you anticipated. I had the problem of the assigned site not being sufficient enough for me to do my report, so I had to go search for a site that I felt was adequate for my topic. This took some extra time. You should also make yourself an outline or even summarize your topic in paragraph form. If you do this, you can just cut and paste later when you need post it on your web page. It saves you a lot of time. Also, don't forget to make personal comments or get comments from your peers in your class. They can bring up points that you hadn't thought of yourself. It is also helpful to take notes after you give your presentation to remember what you talked about and what points or suggestions were made. If your topic was discussed in previous generations, it may be helpful to go back and look at their oral presentations too.

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