Hyper-Realistic Virtual Influencers (HVIs): Multi-Sited Perceptions of Content Creators in Colombia, Mexico, Spain, and China

This study analyzes, using an exploratory, multi-sited qualitative approach, how digital content creators and managers in Colombia, Mexico, Spain, and China perceive the commercial use of hyper-realistic female virtual influencers. The corpus comprised three focus groups in Colombia as the empirical core, two contrasting focus groups in Mexico and Spain, and five semi-structured interviews in China with a total of 30 individuals participating, selected through purposive sampling using criterion and maximum variation strategies. The thematic analysis was based on a codebook combining deductive and inductive components, researcher triangulation, and contrasting between techniques and contexts. The findings indicate that whether the participants accept these influencers or not depends on communicative traceability, transparency, human endorsement, congruence between brand, product, and audience, and organizational accountability. The participants associated hyper-realism with gaining one’s attention, but were skeptical of them when they associated them with artificiality, body idealization, or lacking any real life experiences. Thus, an interpretive model of communicative legitimacy is proposed herein that incorporates trust, aesthetics, ethics, gender representation, and reputation, and defines the conditions for using these virtual influencers responsibly in digital campaigns.