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The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement

The benefits of nature tourism, or nature-based travel, are plentiful. For example, participation in nature tours has positively impacted environmental attitudes and behaviors. Unfortunately, while psychologically beneficial, nature-based tourism can hurt the environment through a myriad of factors....

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Autor principal: Ball, Christopher
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10620436/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37311166
http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2022.0240
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author Ball, Christopher
author_facet Ball, Christopher
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description The benefits of nature tourism, or nature-based travel, are plentiful. For example, participation in nature tours has positively impacted environmental attitudes and behaviors. Unfortunately, while psychologically beneficial, nature-based tourism can hurt the environment through a myriad of factors. Therefore, we must continue to explore ways to make the benefits of nature-based travel more sustainable and impactful. Research suggests that nature-based travel in virtual reality (VR) may impart numerous travel benefits, such as improving conservational behavior and interconnectedness with nature. While these early findings are promising, questions remain regarding the theoretical mechanisms underlying the effects of nature-based VR travel. Therefore, this study explores how VR may provide an avenue to make nature tourism more environmentally friendly while simultaneously making people more environmentally connected and conscious. Furthermore, a theoretical framework is posited that combines concepts from the spatial presence and narrative persuasion literature to help explain the effects. To accomplish these goals, an experiment was conducted using a two-condition (VR travel vs. TV control) between-subjects factorial design with random assignment. The participants were 66 college students from a large Midwestern University in the United States. Results indicated that there wasn't a statistically significant difference between the VR travel condition and the television (TV) control condition regarding the environmental outcome variables. However, while the nature-based VR travel experience did not appear to influence the environmental outcome variables directly, it did indirectly affect them through the mediating roles of spatial presence and narrative engagement.
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spelling pubmed-106204362023-11-03 The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement Ball, Christopher Cyberpsychol Behav Soc Netw Spotlight On: The Psychosocial Impacts of Digital Travel The benefits of nature tourism, or nature-based travel, are plentiful. For example, participation in nature tours has positively impacted environmental attitudes and behaviors. Unfortunately, while psychologically beneficial, nature-based tourism can hurt the environment through a myriad of factors. Therefore, we must continue to explore ways to make the benefits of nature-based travel more sustainable and impactful. Research suggests that nature-based travel in virtual reality (VR) may impart numerous travel benefits, such as improving conservational behavior and interconnectedness with nature. While these early findings are promising, questions remain regarding the theoretical mechanisms underlying the effects of nature-based VR travel. Therefore, this study explores how VR may provide an avenue to make nature tourism more environmentally friendly while simultaneously making people more environmentally connected and conscious. Furthermore, a theoretical framework is posited that combines concepts from the spatial presence and narrative persuasion literature to help explain the effects. To accomplish these goals, an experiment was conducted using a two-condition (VR travel vs. TV control) between-subjects factorial design with random assignment. The participants were 66 college students from a large Midwestern University in the United States. Results indicated that there wasn't a statistically significant difference between the VR travel condition and the television (TV) control condition regarding the environmental outcome variables. However, while the nature-based VR travel experience did not appear to influence the environmental outcome variables directly, it did indirectly affect them through the mediating roles of spatial presence and narrative engagement. Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers 2023-09-01 2023-09-11 /pmc/articles/PMC10620436/ /pubmed/37311166 http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2022.0240 Text en © Christopher Ball 2023; Published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License [CC-BY] (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Spotlight On: The Psychosocial Impacts of Digital Travel
Ball, Christopher
The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title_full The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title_fullStr The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title_full_unstemmed The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title_short The Effects of Nature-Based Travel in Virtual Reality: The Role of Spatial Presence and Narrative Engagement
title_sort effects of nature-based travel in virtual reality: the role of spatial presence and narrative engagement
topic Spotlight On: The Psychosocial Impacts of Digital Travel
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10620436/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37311166
http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2022.0240
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