A research group comprised of researchers from Waseda University, Tokyo City University, TIS Inc., Okayama University of Science, and Shibaura Institute of Technology has clarified the impact of third-person perspective discussions in virtual space on group decision-making. The research findings were presented and made public on April 13, 2026, at “CHI 2026,” a top international conference in the field of Human-Computer Integration (HCI).
The experiment was conducted with 48 groups of three people (144 participants in total, aged 20-49) recruited from the general public. Participants were asked to discuss using either a third-person or first-person perspective, and the quality of decision-making, communication behavior, and participants’ perceptions were compared. The third-person perspective was set to a viewpoint diagonally above and behind the avatar, while the first-person perspective was set to a viewpoint at the avatar’s head. The groups of three discussed each of the two topics, and the results of their decision-making were evaluated from multiple perspectives.
The experimental results showed that using a third-person perspective improved the ability to infer others’ final opinions compared to using a first-person perspective. Furthermore, both relationship conflict and issue conflict within the group decreased, indicating that the discussion progressed more collaboratively. In addition, the degree to which participants’ own final opinions aligned with the group consensus was high, suggesting that participants genuinely agreed.
On the other hand, it was observed that using a third-person perspective reduced emotional interdependence within the group and decreased empathy. This may make it unsuitable for situations where empathy and active listening are important, such as mental health consultations and team building.
The research group states that “situation-adaptive perspective control,” which involves introducing a third-person perspective when conflicts escalate and switching to a first-person perspective when discussions stall, is effective. Combining this with AI-assisted facilitation is also listed as a topic for future consideration.
Ide Masahiro of TIS Inc. commented, “We have demonstrated that participating in meetings from a broad, third-person perspective can mitigate conflict and facilitate smoother consensus building. This could be a clue to solving challenges common to many organizations.”
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This article is an English translation of an original Japanese article, translated by the Mogura VR editorial team.
Reference
https://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000001932.000011650.html
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3772318.3791367
