{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,3]],"date-time":"2026-05-03T03:17:50Z","timestamp":1777778270018,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":46,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2003,9,1]],"date-time":"2003-09-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1062374400000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/page\/policies\/text-and-data-mining-license"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Information Visualization"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2003,9]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>This paper presents a visualization tool set that can be used to visualize the evolution of three-dimensional (3D) virtual environments, the distribution of their virtual inhabitants over time and space, the formation and diffusion of groups, the influence of group leaders, and the environmental and social influences on chat and diffusion patterns for small (1 \u2013 100 participants) but also rather large user groups (more than 100 participants). The techniques are applied to analyze and visualize data recorded during events in virtual worlds, as well as simulated data, but are also applicable to real-world data. Resulting visualizations can and have been used to ease social navigation in 3D virtual worlds, help evaluate and optimize the design of virtual worlds, and provide a means to study the communities evolving in virtual worlds. The visualizations are particularly valuable for analyzing events that are spread out in time and\/or space or events that involve a very large number of participants. The paper reviews and builds upon research in information visualization, scientific visualization, geography, architecture, and social science. It discusses intended user groups and their tasks and how the proposed techniques support those tasks. Three dimensional virtual world technologies are briefly described before the visualization tool set is explained in detail together with sample applications. The paper concludes with a discussion of results and an outlook for future work.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2003,11,20]],"date-time":"2003-11-20T05:32:59Z","timestamp":1069306379000},"page":"182-198","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":35,"title":["Social Diffusion Patterns in Three-Dimensional Virtual Worlds"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"2","author":[{"given":"Katy","family":"B\u00f6rner","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Indiana University, SLIS, Bloomington, IN, U.S.A."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Shashikant","family":"Penumarthy","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Indiana University, Computer Science Department, Bloomington, IN, U.S.A."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2003,9,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Avatars! Exploring and Building Virtual Worlds on the Internet","author":"Damer B.","year":"1998"},{"key":"bibr2-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/3-540-45016-5_1"},{"key":"bibr3-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"B\u00f6rner K. iScape: a collaborative memory palace for digital library search results. International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, Vol. 1: Usability Evaluation and Interface Design (New Orleans, LA, 2001), Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: London; 1160\u20131164."},{"key":"bibr4-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/3-540-45636-8_20"},{"key":"bibr5-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/IV.2002.1028752"},{"key":"bibr6-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"B\u00f6rner K, Lin Y-C. Visualizing chat log data collected in 3-D virtual worlds. International Information Visualisation Conference (London, England 2001); 141\u2013146.","DOI":"10.1109\/IV.2001.942050"},{"key":"bibr7-palgrave.ivs.9500050","first-page":"31","volume":"35","author":"Savery JR","year":"1995","journal-title":"Educational Technology"},{"key":"bibr8-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Herring S, B\u00f6rner K, Swan M. Spatial reference in communication in a 3-D virtual world. Colloquium on Language and the New Media British Association of Applied Linguistics (Cardiff, Wales 2002)."},{"key":"bibr9-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier","author":"Rheingold H.","year":"1993"},{"key":"bibr10-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Dynamic timelines: visualizing historical information in three dimensions","author":"Kullberg RL","year":"1995"},{"key":"bibr11-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Plaisant C, Milash B, Rose A, Widoff S, Shneiderman B. Life Lines: Visualizing personal histories. ACM CHI 1996 Conference Proceedings 1996, ACM Press: New York; 221\u2013227.","DOI":"10.1145\/238386.238493"},{"key":"bibr12-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Communities in Cyberspace: Perspectives on New Forms of Social Organization","author":"Smith M.","year":"1998"},{"key":"bibr13-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1083-6101.1999.tb00107.x"},{"key":"bibr14-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Demographic participation in the discursive management of usenet","author":"Paolillo J","year":"2002"},{"key":"bibr15-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Discourse diagrams: interface design for very large scale conversations","author":"Sack W.","year":"2000"},{"key":"bibr16-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Skog T, Holmquist LE. WebAware: Continuous visualization of Web site activity in a public space. Proceedings of the CHI 2000 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems 2000; 351\u2013352.","DOI":"10.1145\/633292.633502"},{"key":"bibr17-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/HICSS.1999.772685"},{"key":"bibr18-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1002\/1532-2890(2000)9999:9999<::AID-ASI1066>3.0.CO;2-Y"},{"key":"bibr19-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Visual Who: Animating the affinities and activities of an electronic community","author":"Donath JS","year":"1995"},{"key":"bibr20-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1145\/302979.302997"},{"key":"bibr21-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"The Ethnography of Communication","author":"Saville-Troike M.","year":"1982"},{"key":"bibr22-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Xiong R, Donath J. PeopleGarden: creating data portraits for users. 12th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, Asheville: North Carolina, USA, 1999; 37\u201344.","DOI":"10.1145\/320719.322581"},{"key":"bibr23-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1145\/332040.332477"},{"key":"bibr24-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Dodge M. An Atlas of Cyberspaces. Multi-User Dimensions (MUDs) & Virtual Worlds. http:\/\/www.cybergeography.org\/atlas\/atlas.html 2000."},{"key":"bibr25-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Smith A. Mapping 30 days in ActiveWorlds, http:\/\/www.casa.ucl.ac.uk\/30days\/mapping.htm. 2000."},{"key":"bibr26-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Darken R, Cevik H. Map usage in virtual environments: orientation issues. Proceedings of Virtual Reality (Houston, TX, 1999), IEEE Computer Society Press: Los Alamitos, CA; 133\u2013140."},{"key":"bibr27-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1145\/238386.238459"},{"key":"bibr28-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"The Image of the City","author":"Lynch KJ","year":"1960"},{"key":"bibr29-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1162\/105474699566251"},{"key":"bibr30-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"Map-based navigation in a graphical MOO","author":"Schafer WA","year":"2001"},{"key":"bibr31-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1075\/pbns.39"},{"key":"bibr32-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Naper I. System features of an inhabited 3-D virtual environment supporting multimodality in communication. 34th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Systems Sciences (Maui, Hawaii, 2000), Los Alamitos, CA: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Computer Society; 4040."},{"key":"bibr33-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Fry B, Organic information design, in Media Lab. MIT; Master's Thesis, 2000."},{"key":"bibr34-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/01621459.1979.10481647"},{"key":"bibr35-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1467-8306.1983.tb01392.x"},{"key":"bibr36-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1538-4632.1981.tb00711.x"},{"key":"bibr37-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9780511597237"},{"key":"bibr38-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces","author":"Whyte WH","year":"1980"},{"key":"bibr39-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Stonor T, Campos MBdA, Smith A. Towards a walkability index. Walk 21: 3rd International Conference, Steps Towards Liveable Cities, 8\u201311.05 2002 (San Sebastian, Spain, 2002)."},{"key":"bibr40-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"Stonor T. From the passangers' perspective: function follows form. Interchange Conference 2001 (Docklands), http:\/\/www.spacesyntax.com\/news\/presentations.htm."},{"key":"bibr41-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9780511815478"},{"key":"bibr42-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume-title":"City: Rediscovering the Center","author":"Whyte WH","year":"1971"},{"key":"bibr43-palgrave.ivs.9500050","volume":"1","author":"Freeman LC","year":"2000","journal-title":"Visualizing Social Networks"},{"key":"bibr44-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"B\u00f6rner K, Virtual World Technologies for Digital Cities of Tomorrow. 2001, Invited Talk at the Panel Collaboration in Building Future Digital Cities. The Second Kyoto Meeting on Digital Cities, Kyoto, Japan, http:\/\/ella.slis.indiana.edu\/\u223ckaty\/research\/dc01-panel.pdf."},{"key":"bibr45-palgrave.ivs.9500050","unstructured":"B\u00f6rner K, Penumarthy S, DeVarco BJ, Kerney C. Visualizing social patterns in virtual environments on a local and global scale. Accepted for Digital Cities 3: Local Information and Communication Infrastructures: Experiences and Challenges 2003 (Amsterdam), (in press)."},{"key":"bibr46-palgrave.ivs.9500050","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1162\/089120100561737"}],"container-title":["Information Visualization"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050","content-type":"application\/pdf","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"text-mining"},{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,29]],"date-time":"2026-04-29T19:19:06Z","timestamp":1777490346000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2003,9]]},"references-count":46,"journal-issue":{"issue":"3","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2003,9]]}},"alternative-id":["10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1057\/palgrave.ivs.9500050","relation":{},"ISSN":["1473-8716","1473-8724"],"issn-type":[{"value":"1473-8716","type":"print"},{"value":"1473-8724","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2003,9]]}}}