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：虚拟人在社交虚拟环境中扮演着关键角色，深刻影响着用户的虚拟现实体验。可用选项的多样性与用户偏好的差异可能导致虚拟人群体的外观呈现异质性。由此产生的高阶拟人化与真实感线索的多样性会引发多重（非）一致性，最终影响体验的可信度。本研究探讨了虚拟人群体（包括共处他者与自我化身）真实感（非）一致性的影响。通过2×3混合实验设计，参与者在连续三次VR暴露中分别具身于（1）个性化写实或（2）定制化风格化自我化身，同时伴随的虚拟他者群体分别为（1）全写实、（2）全风格化或（3）混合类型。研究结果表明，具有更高真实感的虚拟他者群体（即可能更契合参与者的现实世界经验与预期）被认为更具类人性，能提升共在感与互动可能性感知。群体同质性相关的（非）一致性未产生显著影响。此外，研究发现当自我化身与参与者自身物理身体的现实经验相契合时，写实个性化化身能显著提升虚拟身体所有权与自我认同感。值得注意的是，风格化自我化身与写实虚拟他者群体之间的不一致性会导致自我定位与自我认同评分降低。最后，我们总结了研究发现的实践意义，并基于当前VR体验理论框架，结合（非）一致性视觉线索及其对虚拟他人感知、自我表征与空间临场感的影响，对研究结果进行了深入讨论。