Multimodal Semiotics and Collaborative Design

than make overall statements and generalizations about SL usage. The issue of representativeness
is also related with strategies of sampling and access to resources. In the case studies, one of the
important determining factors for selecting collaborative co-design processes to observe was the
availability of the VWs Research Group’s already-existing partnerships to institutions, residents
and builders. The establishment of these academic and professional partnerships, before and
during the PhD project, enabled me with a wide variety of knowledge resources, which, in turn,
might have limited the scope of the project in terms of sampling of data resources. However, I
believe my approach legitimizes the validity and reliability of its fundamental participatory
ethnographic framework by triangulation of the knowledge resources, utilization of multiple
methods and resources of data produced from multiple case studies and the focus on designer’s
discourses to be emphasized.
On the other hand, no matter how variously multiple these data resources were, they were still
mostly virtual. There are both negative and positive aspects of conducting qualitative research in
virtual environments, most of which are documented by previous research 9 . In this study, several
virtual methods were applied in combination with more traditional methods, including avatarbased
participatory design observation, inworld voice/text chat, Skype and e-mail interviews with
designers, collecting virtual objects and travelling with avatars, etc. Major limitations of these
methods were the anonymity caused by the avatar-based presence, lack of face-to-face cues during
interviews and observations, and needs for technical infrastructure, as well as complex
coordination and communication skills in VEs. While some participants provided me with the RL
names, some preferred to use only their avatar names with limited personal information 10 . The
problem of anonymity was not a major one for the design of this research study, mainly because I
had personal (either offline or online) access to most participants, while others, who I know only as
avatars, were already working in these projects for a long time and had their avatars’ name
recognized by others. Participants were all able to confirm each other’s participation during the
interviews, which helped resolving these considerations on anonymity and credibility. On the other
hand, the lack of physical presence is replaced with the potential to overcome geographic and
physical barriers and meeting participants in a shared virtual environment in real-time interaction
with their avatars. This aspect of SL offers freedom to navigate, move/modify and create virtual
objects and multimodal demonstration of discussion issues. Considering the fact that these inworld
interviewees included a hearing-impaired British university student, or an engineer from France
who wanders the sims of SL as a builder for the last 3 years, this decentralized, multimodal and
9 For instance, see Jensen (2012a, 2012b) for detailed discussions of avatar-watching and video interviews combining
both real and virtual environments.
10 In my analysis, I changed each participant’s name to a pseudo-nickname, usually inspired by the names that they
have provided me.
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