(Un)linking value in metaversal environments
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21119430 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Mariana Berga Rodrigues (0000-0003-3235-7592, Iscte – Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, corresponding author), Sandra Maria Correia Loureiro (0000-0001-8362-4430, Iscte – Instituto Universitário de Lisboa) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Pages | 1-18 |
| Publication date | 2026-06-29 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Consumption Markets & Culture (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1025-3866 • E-ISSN: 1477-223X |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/10253866.2026.2692937 |
| OpenAlex | W7166562183 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 51 |
As digital social life becomes increasingly fragmented and mediated, existing consumer culture frameworks struggle to explain how social bonds form in immersive digital environments. In particular, the concept of linking value offers limited insight into emerging forms of digitally mediated social connection. Drawing on a netnographic analysis of VR-related subreddits, focused on shared movie-watching experiences in social metaversal environments, this study pursues three objectives: (1) to reconceptualize linking value beyond tribalism through heterotopia; (2) to examine how immersive spatial configurations shape social connection; (3) to uncover the sociotechnical conditions that facilitate the emplacement of metaversal heterotopias. Findings show that loneliness underpins the emergence of these spaces as compensatory sites of connection; that flexible spatial configurations afford users agency to negotiate norms and legitimacy; and that metaversal heterotopias foster new socialities while risking disconnection from offline relationships, revealing the paradoxical dynamics of (un)linking value in digital consumer culture
Agency (philosophy) · Cyberspace · Disconnection · Loneliness · Negotiation · Sociality · Sociotechnical system · Structure and agency · Value (mathematics) · Action Observation and Synchronization · Embodied and Extended Cognition · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition
The Metaverse
Social interactions in the metaverse
Ethical Consumption Communities Across Physical and Digital Spaces
The plurality principle
Anxiety in digital consumer culture
Algorithmic consumer culture
Mu l tiple embodiment relations
Tribal entrepreneurs
Hybrid consumer activism in Fairtrade Towns
The future of digital space
From grassroots to digital ties
Media practices in the making of an “other space”
Heterotopic erotic oases
Who Am I Here? Care Consumers’ Identity Processes and Family Caregiver Interventions in the Elderscape
Of Other Spaces
Virtual reality and videogames
Analysis and Interpretation of Qualitative Data in Consumer Research
The Body as (Another) Place
Consumer Movements and Collective Creativity
The Regeneration of Consumer Movement Solidarity
Reimagining the inevitable
How algorithmic cultural recommendation influence the marketing of cultural collections
Regaining control through reclamation
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |