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Emotionalise Me: Self-reporting and Arousal Measurements in Virtual Tourism Environments

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Book cover Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism 2018

Abstract

The technological developments regarding Virtual Reality (VR) are providing new opportunities for the tourism industry. This research investigates the application of fully-immersive VR systems in tourism marketing and analyses how it influences emotional responses and decision-making. During a laboratory experiment, subjective measurements were combined with physiological measurements of arousal. Study participants were exposed to a 360-degree destination marketing video, using either a head-mounted display (HMD) or a desktop-PC. Whereas the physiological parameters of heart rate and electrodermal activity showed a significant increase with the HMD-group, subjective evaluation of emotions and decision-making did not indicate any significant differences. These partly contradicting results suggest further investigation of emotions and arousal measurement, analysis and interpretation through field experiments. Nevertheless, from subjective opinions of participants and participant observations it could be concluded that VR as a marketing tool has the potential to increase positive emotions. Taken the enthusiasm and interest for VR in tourism into account, recommendations concerning investment in VR technology are given.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank DI Michael Domhardt, research assistant of the MultiMedia Technology department of the University of Applied Sciences Salzburg, who developed the hard- and software tools applied in the laboratory experiment.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Salzburg, Austria

    Julia Beck & Roman Egger

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  1. Julia Beck
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  2. Roman Egger
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Correspondence to Julia Beck .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, University of Surrey, Guildford, United Kingdom

    Brigitte Stangl

  2. Business School, Centre for Tourism Studies, University of Eastern Finland, Kuopio, Finland

    Juho Pesonen

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Beck, J., Egger, R. (2018). Emotionalise Me: Self-reporting and Arousal Measurements in Virtual Tourism Environments. In: Stangl, B., Pesonen, J. (eds) Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism 2018. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72923-7_1

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