ABSTRACT
PurposeThis research paper aims to explore Airbnb's online experience initiative, which has sparked a new wave of virtual tourism to improvise a large assortment of experiential activities through cyberspace. It works to answer questions pertinent to the type of virtual experiences tourists seek and how these experiences could fulfill tourist needs, thereby rendering favorable socio-mental outcomes through experiences encountered.Design/methodology/approachDrawing on travel experience and transformative tourism theoretical tenets, this qualitative inquiry used data collected from social media posts from virtual tourists.FindingsResults reveal four major themes of online experiences – hedonism, attention restoration, social relatedness and self-exaltation – that encompass 12 experiential categories. They further underscore four types of transformative mechanisms pinpointing hedonic well-being, environmental-mastery well-being, social well-being and eudaimonic well-being.Research limitations/implicationsResearch findings demonstrate how Airbnb exercised marketing agility during severe environmental plight;while expediting strategic initiatives that offer tourists and residents alike a means to reengage in leisure and travel activities at home. They also salvage the peer-to-peer community by turning accommodation hosts into online experience ambassadors.Originality/valueThe contribution of this inquiry lies in assessing virtual experiences and reconnecting how different cyber experiences can meet an array of tourist needs. This study further highlights the transformative virtual experience paradigm to lay the necessary theoretical foundation for future research on virtual transformative tourism. This research goes beyond the common understanding of transformative tourism that relies merely on corporeal encounters. From a practical point of view, this study brings light to a novel concept – sharing experience economy – that incorporates the nuances between sharing economy and experience economy.
ABSTRACT
PurposeThis study aims to use mixed methods to create a new conceptual framework to understand the unique characteristics of virtual tourism experiences (VTE), which has not been systemically examined.Design/methodology/approachStudy 1 uses topic modeling with Latent Dirichlet Allocation to analyze 91,609 online reviews from the Airbnb Experience platform. Study 2 uses content analysis of open-ended qualitative responses from VTE customers. The two studies together are used to build a new conceptual model.FindingsBuilding upon the Stimulus–Organism–Response (S-O-R) model and the experience economy, results present a new conceptual model and identify VTE as unique in terms of Stimulus (education, entertainment, esthetics, escapism and connection), Organism (experiencing synchronicity, telepresence, participation and customization, emotion) and Response (evaluation and behavioral responses). Given the uniqueness of VTE, the new construct of the virtual servicescape is incorporated, recognizing the host, the focal customer and other customers, and the technology as the four main components.Practical implicationsThe proposed framework can be used to guide the design, development, and evaluation of VTE, including identifying the key considerations, engagement within the ecosystem and providing guidance to hosts and operators.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that systematically explores VTE and proposes the theoretical framework to comprehensively understand this new form of experience in sharing economy by combining the unique aspects of the stimulus, organism, response and virtual servicescape.
ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 pandemic compelled traditional in-person events to begin transforming into more innovative and safer experiences by utilizing various virtual experience platforms (VEP). This study explores the salient determinants affecting the self-paced hiking or race event attendees' intention to continue attending the event through the use of VEP based on two robust theories: the expectation–confirmation model (ECM) and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) model. Data were collected from 243 event attendees of a self-paced hiking event in South Korea and analyzed using a PLS-SEM approach. The results of this study demonstrate that performance expectancy had the most significant effect on the event attendees' continuance intention to use VEP, followed by satisfaction, hedonic motivation, and price value. The implications of these findings for event firms and organizations utilizing VEP are discussed. [ FROM AUTHOR]
ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 healthcare crisis dramatically changed educational opportunities for undergraduate students. To overcome the lack of exposure to lab research and provide an alternative to cancelled classes and online lectures, the Lyda Hill Department of Bioinformatics at UT Southwestern Medical Center established an innovative, fully remote and paid "U-Hack Med Gap Year" internship program. At the core of the internship program were dedicated biomedical research projects spanning nine months in fields as diverse as computational microscopy, bioimage analysis, genome sequence analysis and establishment of a surgical skill analysis platform. To complement the project work, a biweekly Gap Year lab meeting was devised with opportunities to develop important skills in presenting, data sharing and analysis of new research. Despite a challenging year, all selected students completed the full internship period and over 30% will continue their project remotely after the end of the program.
ABSTRACT
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has enforced governments across the world to impose social restrictions on the movement of people and confined them to their homes to avoid the spread of the disease. This not only forbids them from leaving their homes but also greatly reduces their physical activities. This situation has brought attention to virtual technologies such as virtual tours or telepresence robots. While these technologies allow people to remotely participate in activities, it does not address the problem of reduction in physical activities due to the pandemic. In this paper, we propose a telepresence robotic system driven by the user's gait to provide an immersive virtual walking experience in remote locations. To this end, we developed a control interface consisting of an automated treadmill that adjusts its speed to the user's pace automatically. This interface is used to control an avatar robot that sends a 360-degree live image back to the user for visual feedback. We conducted an evaluation experiment to compare the experience using the proposed system in two different conditions to that of regular walking. The results indicated that the proposed system gives an immersive and realistic virtual walking experience while demanding physical effort from the user. © 2022 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
This study investigated the physiological and psychological therapeutic effects of a digital Shinrin-yoku environment constructed indoors in an urban facility as well as the characteristics of the environment that contribute to restorativeness (restorative traits). We measured the fluctuations in the physical and mental states of 25 subjects by obtaining both before-after measurements and continuous measurements while exposed to a digital Shinrin-yoku environment that reproduced visual, auditory, and olfactory elements. The results demonstrated that the parasympathetic nerve activity was significantly increased and that the heart rate was significantly decreased during the exposure compared with that during the resting state. As for mood, five of the six Profile of Mood States (POMS) scales ("Tension-Anxiety," "Depression," "Anger-Hostility," "Fatigue," and "Confusion") were significantly decreased after the experience. In addition, psychological restorative effects were also confirmed, with a significant decrease in "negative affect" (measured using the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS)) and a significant increase in the sense of restorativeness (Restorative Outcome Scale (ROS)) after the experience. In contrast, comparing the digital Shinrin-yoku environment with the actual forest environment and the urban environment using POMS, PANAS, ROS, and Perceived Restorativeness Scale (PRS), the psychological effects and environmental traits of the digital Shinrin-yoku were found to be considerably similar to those of the actual forest environment.