Extending QoE Research: Addressing Harassment in Social VR Through Feminist Digital Ethnography

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Aleksandra Zheleva, Katleen Gabriels, Maria Torres Vega

Published: 2025, Last Modified: 02 Mar 2026QoMEX 2025EveryoneRevisionsBibTeXCC BY-SA 4.0
Abstract: Social Virtual Reality (SVR) enables immersive, avatar-based interaction, introducing new dimensions of presence, co-presence, and social engagement. While existing Quality of Experience (QoE) frameworks capture technical and perceptual aspects of user experience, they often overlook the social, relational, and power-sensitive dimensions that shape users’ realities in SVR. This paper proposes Feminist Digital Ethnography (FDE) as a complementary methodology for QoE research, foregrounding reflexivity, intersectionality, and ethical care. Applied to a case study in VRChat, FDE helps surface lived experiences often missed by traditional approaches—revealing how platform affordances, digital embodiment, and social structures interact. By demonstrating FDE’s potential to expand QoE frameworks, this work contributes to more inclusive and context-aware understandings of user experience in SVR.