VR as a Persuasive Technology “in the Wild”. The Effect of Immersive VR on Intent to Change Towards Water Conservation

Abstract

The combination of VR with the correct psychological mechanism could become a powerful persuasion system to stimulate intent to change towards important environmental issues such as water conservation. However, very limited research has been reported on VR usage in this area. Therefore, we conducted a between-groups study to investigate whether the level of presence felt in a VR environment together with a trigger mechanism such as guilt could spark intent to change towards water conservation. Participants were exposed to a persuasive message about water conservation in one of three conditions: audio only, simple VR and visually rich VR. Forty participants completed the study “in the wild”. The results showed that while intent to change increased in all three groups, both VR groups indicated lower levels of change than the audio only group. Additionally, a positive correlation, albeit small, was found between presence and cued recall along with presence and intent to change. These results furthermore showed that presence could play a role in behavior modification and intent to change.