Moe-Phobia: Effect of Users' Gender on Perceived Sexuality and Likability Toward Manga-Like Virtual Agents

Abstract

In Japan, many incidents regarding manga-like virtual agents have happened recently, in which critics have indicated that virtual agents used in public spaces are too sexual. Prior study defined this perception as “moe-phobia.” In many cases, critics have pointed to agents' clothes. However, after verifying actual moe-phobia incidents, I hypothesize that these incidents are associated with not only the agents' clothes but also the situations in which they are used. I conducted an experiment with three factors and two levels to verify this hypothesis. The independent values were the agents' clothes, usage scenario, and the gender of the participants. The dependent values were the agents' trustworthiness, familiarity, likability, sexuality, and suitability as perceived by humans. I conducted the experiment with female and male groups and conducted a three-way ANOVA for each dependent value for each group. As a result, I observed a different tendency regarding the impression of the agents between female and male groups; however, both groups had the same tendency regarding the perceived suitability. The female and male participants judged the agents' suitability from not only their clothes but also the scenario.

Moe-Phobia and Conservative Mentality

“…That is, a person does not only react simply to the external "sexual depiction" of a moe character, but the image of the character as a whole is determined by the combination of the character and the context in which it is used. Furthermore, Matsui 9 conducted a participant experiment and confirmed that moe-phobia is not influenced by only one factor, "the appearance of the character," but by two factors, "the appearance of the character" and "the context in which the character is used," showing an interaction effect. This means, in other words, that when a person views a moe character, he or she is reading two layers at the first level of "appearance characteristics" and at the second level of "social context."…”

“…This corresponds to the second independent variable, "context," and is defined as the two conditions of the science museum condition and the swimming pool condition. Intuitively, "white coat" and "science museum" and "swimsuit" and "swimming pool" seem to have a high affinity with each other, and based on Matsui 9 , "swimsuit" is an appearance that gives a strong sexual impression at first glance, but when placed in the context of "swimming pool," which is an environment in which people are more comfortable seeing swimsuits, the sexual impression of and aversion toward the swimsuit are expected to be reduced. Figure 3 is images used in the experiment.…”

“…The next question was designed to measure the participants' conservative tendencies. This question was adapted from 9 . Participants answered all questions on a 7-point scale, and the total value was defined as the "degree of conservative inclination."…”

“…Ito defines such psychological resistance and rejection of moe characters as "moe-phobia" 8 , and in this paper, I focus on a type of moe-phobia in which people reject moe characters by reading excessive sexual meanings into them, and I conduct a survey and experiment. Matsui 9 used a case study in which a Red Cross blood donation poster featuring "Uzaki-chan ha asobi tai" was criticized. The "Love Tights Campaign" conducted over SNS by the women's underwear manufacturer Atsugi was criticized, and the VTuber Kizuna Ai was criticized when she appeared on NHK's news program.…”

“…In other words, it is not only the external characteristics of moe characters that are subject to criticism (e.g., revealing clothing, coordination of sexual parts, etc. ), but also the social context in which they are featured 9 . That is, a person does not only react simply to the external "sexual depiction" of a moe character, but the image of the character as a whole is determined by the combination of the character and the context in which it is used.…”