According to this article in Nature some social rules (such as personal space) map over into artificial realities, hence virtual worlds (in this case Second Life) will offer a new platform for doing experiments.
Here is the original paper on which the Nature article was based. And here is a blog with some comments questioning the researchers’ interpretations. Here is another blog with commentary.
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Thanks for the refs,
Yee el al. have done a great job. Recently, Yee published articles in PRESENCE and in Game & Culture. Worth reading. Check them out:
Yee, N. (2006). The Demographics, Motivations, and Derived Experiences of Users of Massively Multi-User Online Graphical Environments. Presence, 15 (3), 294-308
Ducheneaut, N., Yee, N., Nickell, E., & Moore, J. R. (2006). Building an MMO with Mass Appeal: A Look at Gameplay in World of Warcraft, Games and Culture, 1, 281-317.
On-line: http://gac.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/1/4/281