A user experience perspective on heritage tourism in the metaverse: Empirical evidence and design dilemmas for VR

Ning Zou Wenjing Yang Qi Zheng + 2 lainnya

8 Maret 2024

A virtual reality (VR) based cultural heritage exhibition (VRCHE) is an important type of VR-based museum exhibition. The user experience (UX) design of VRCHE has encountered opportunities and due to the differences in human–computer interaction between VR-based and conventional interaction interfaces, so proposing the UX model of VRCHE is crucial. Although there are some existing works that study the UX models of VRCHEs, they are not complete enough to describe the UX of VRCHEs or offer any design strategies due to the methodologies and experimental materials that they currently use. This study creates experiments utilizing grounded theory that combine qualitative and quantitative approaches. Then, the study synthesizes three-level coding and quantitative analysis findings from grounded theory, builds a detailed model of the VRCHE UX using theoretical coding, and proposes design strategies.

JiYang Yi Hae Sun Kim

29 September 2021

Wearable Mixed Reality (MR) technology is a tool that gives people a new enhanced experience that they have not encountered before. This study shows the process of designing new museum experiences while considering how this technology changes previous museum experiences, what those experiences are, and what people should feel through these experiences. This process was systematically conducted according to the UX design process of analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. In the analysis step, six types of museum artifact viewing experiences were defined: knowing, restoring, exploring, expanded scale, encountering, and sharing experience through research and user surveys related to the museum experience. In addition, through research analysis related to MR technology, presence, flow, and natural interaction were defined as three essential factors that users should feel in the MR experience. In the synthesis stage, optimized wearable MR experiences were designed and implemented by applying the necessary experience types and essential factors according to the characteristics of each artifact. In the evaluation stage, user experience evaluations such as user experience tests for essential factors in the MR experience, User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ) tests for interaction products, and the Visual Aesthetics of Websites Inventory (VisAWI) test for visual experiences from various perspectives were conducted on the developed results. Through these evaluations, users gave positive scores to the design results based on the experience types and essential factors defined in this study. When applying new media technologies such as wearable MR technology, improved technology implementation is important, but an understanding of the applied field must first be obtained, and user analysis must first be thoroughly conducted. This study will be a guide to the systematic development process to be followed when applying wearable MR technology to other fields.

Urvashi Tandon Myriam Ertz Néji Bouslama + 1 lainnya

5 Oktober 2023

Drawing on media richness theory, this study investigates the effect of rich media, such as virtual reality (VR), on visit intentions for a specific destination. Specifically, this research employs a mixed-method approach, using abductive theorization to explore and confirm the dimensions of the VR visit experience, notably those related to telepresence, a key concept in tourism through VR. Furthermore, the study aims to elucidate how telepresence influences mental imagery, attitudes towards tourist destinations, and actual visit intentions. To do this, qualitative data were gathered between February and June 2022 from 34 semi-structured interviews with respondents who viewed a VR video of the destination. A second study collected quantitative data from 400 participants through face-to-face questionnaires after a VR video view between June and August 2022. The findings reveal that telepresence comprises three dimensions: realism of the virtual environment, immersion, and the sense of presence in the virtual environment. Telepresence, in turn, both directly and indirectly affects actual visit intentions, with mental imagery and attitude toward tourist destinations partially mediating those relationships. This study provides methodological, theoretical, and tourism management implications to enhance our comprehension of telepresence’s facets, its measurement, and the process by which VR influences real visit intentions.

Meltem Altinay Ozdemir

2021

The study investigated the roles of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) for accessibility and marketing in tourism. Literature is reviewed in this exploratory study and examples of VR and AR for accessibility and marketing in the tourism industry are presented. The review was conducted with two perspectives: accessibility role and marketing role of VR and AR technologies in the tourism industry. As a result of reviewing, these technologies have both strengths and weaknesses for accessibility in tourism. VR has both strengths such as a secure environment, alternative access, and weaknesses such as user neglect, high cost. Similarly, AR has both strengths such as knowledge enrichment, enhancement of experience, and weaknesses such as high cost, lack of security. The high cost of both technologies restricts accessibility and marketing. Also, VR and AR have benefits as reducing strategy costs, attracting tourists with gamification strategies, ease of brand promotion, building brand loyalty, collecting data, and customized product development in tourism marketing.

Elios De Maio Rojin Bayat Jacopo Fiorenza + 2 lainnya

5 Juni 2024

The emergence of Virtual Reality (VR) and meta-verse have opened doors to new research opportunities and frontiers in User Experience (UX). Within the cultural heritage domain, one of the key concepts is that of the Virtual Museums (VMs), whose definition has been extended through time by many research works and applications. However, most of the studies performed so far focused on only one application, and studied its UX without taking into account the experience with other VR experiences possibly available in the VM. The purpose of this work is to give a contribution for an optimal design to create a unified UX across multiple VR experiences. More specifically, the research included the development of two applications, respectively a VM in a metaverse platform and a virtual learning workshop as an individual application. With this premise, the study will also consider two fundamental elements for an effective UX design: a Virtual Environment (VE) and an Intelligent Virtual Avatar (IVA). In particular, the latest was developed following current trends about generative AI, integrating an IVA powered by a Large Language Model (LLM).