Virtual humans play a pivotal role in social virtual environments, shaping users' VR experiences. The diversity in available options and users' preferences can result in a heterogeneous mix of appearances among a group of virtual humans. The resulting variety in higher-order anthropomorphic and realistic cues introduces multiple (in)congruencies, eventually impacting the plausibility of the experience. In this work, we consider the impact of (in)congruencies in the realism of a group of virtual humans, including co-located others and one's self-avatar. In a 2 x 3 mixed design, participants embodied either (1) a personalized realistic or (2) a customized stylized self-avatar across three consecutive VR exposures in which they were accompanied by a group of virtual others being either (1) all realistic, (2) all stylized, or (3) mixed. Our results indicate groups of virtual others of higher realism, i.e., potentially more congruent with participants' real-world experiences and expectations, were considered more human-like, increasing the feeling of co-presence and the impression of interaction possibilities. (In)congruencies concerning the homogeneity of the group did not cause considerable effects. Furthermore, our results indicate that a self-avatar's congruence with the participant's real-world experiences concerning their own physical body yielded notable benefits for virtual body ownership and self-identification for realistic personalized avatars. Notably, the incongruence between a stylized self-avatar and a group of realistic virtual others resulted in diminished ratings of self-location and self-identification. We conclude on the implications of our findings and discuss our results within current theories of VR experiences, considering (in)congruent visual cues and their impact on the perception of virtual others, self-representation, and spatial presence.

翻译：虚拟人类在社交虚拟环境中扮演着关键角色，塑造着用户的虚拟现实体验。可选虚拟人类形象的多样性以及用户偏好的差异，可能导致群体中出现异质化的外貌混合。由此产生的更高阶拟人化与现实感线索的多样性，会引入多重（不）一致性，最终影响体验的逼真度。本研究考察了一组虚拟人类（包括共处同一空间的他人及用户自身的外显化身）在现实感上存在（不）一致性所带来的影响。通过一项2×3混合设计实验，参与者在连续三次虚拟现实暴露中分别体验了（1）个性化写实或（2）定制化风格化的自身外显化身，每次暴露中他们被一组虚拟他人所伴随，这些虚拟他人要么（1）全部写实、（2）全部风格化，要么（3）混合呈现。我们的结果表明，具有更高现实感的虚拟他人群体（即更可能与参与者的真实世界经验和预期一致的群体）被认为更具类人性，从而增强了共同存在感以及对交互可能性的印象。关于群体同质性的（不）一致性并未产生显著影响。此外，我们的结果指出，自身外显化身与参与者对其自身身体在真实世界中的经验之间的一致性，对于写实个性化外显化身的虚拟身体所有权和自我认同带来了显著益处。值得注意的是，风格化自身外显化身与一群写实虚拟他人之间的不一致性，导致了对自我位置感和自我认同的评分下降。我们总结了研究结果的启示，并基于当前虚拟现实体验的理论框架讨论了本研究结果，考察了（不）一致的视觉线索及其对虚拟他人感知、自我表征及空间存在感的影响。