Face Value: Cultural Orientations and Facial Expressions in Social Virtual Reality

Social Virtual Reality (SVR) enables cross-cultural interaction through embodied avatars using verbal and nonverbal cues, yet cultural communication norms may shape how these cues are interpreted. Drawing on Hall’s high–low context communication framework, this study examines how individual-level cultural orientation (individualism vs. collectivism) influences embodied interaction in SVR. A laboratory experiment with 150 participants from Taiwan and the United States compared SVR conditions with high versus low facial-expression cues. The moderated mediation model showed that enabling facial expressions in SVR increased individualism-leaning participants’ perceived social presence, which further increased perceived physical attractiveness, cognitive and affective trust toward their conversation partners, as well as more cognitive absorption in the task. In contrast, facial cues had no significant effects for collectivist-leaning participants. These findings suggest that cultural orientation shapes how users leverage nonverbal cues, particularly facial expressions, to form social impressions in SVR environments.