‘It felt like the digital hands were my hands’: Spotlines and rhythm in the habituation of virtual reality and meta-spaces

How people use virtual reality to connect, communicate, and learn is increasingly important as the metaverse expands. Using affordance theory, we analyze a university classroom, a collaborative virtual environment, situated in virtual reality (VR). Our longitudinal study spans 10 weeks and follows 15 participants who spent over 25 hours together in meta-space classroom habitats. To capture a wide range of conditions around VR affordances (avatars, embodiment, immersion/presence), we turn to spotlines , a method that combines various medialities, to compare and describe the temporal rhythms of VR habituation. Through sustained engagement in VR, this study reveals how meta-spaces function as habitats that foster avatar sociality, metalearning, and embodied moments of friction.