Determining Visitor Engagement through Augmented Reality at Science Festivals: An Experience Economy Perspective

Augmented reality (AR) has been increasingly implemented to enhance visitor experiences, and tourism research has long understood the importance of creating memorable experiences, leading to the research era of experience economy. Although technology-enhanced visitor engagement is crucial for science festivals, research focusing on visitor engagement through AR using the experience economy perspective is limited. Therefore, the aim of this study is to examine how the educational, esthetics, escapist and entertainment experience using AR affect visitor satisfaction and memorable experience, and eventually, lead to visitor engagement with science experiences in the context of science festivals. A total of 220 data inputs were collected as part of the European City of Science festivities and Manchester Science Festival 2016 and analyzed using structural equation modelling. Findings show that the four realms of experience economy influence satisfaction and memory and, ultimately, the intention for visitor engagement with science research at science festivals. Theoretical contributions and practical implications are presented and discussed

The Truth About Negative Emotions: the crucial role of service employees for the customer experience: An Abstract

Our paper challenges several notions regarding emotion’s role and their influence on the customer experience (hereafter CX). Emotions play a distinguishing role in CX. This research deepens our understanding on the crucial role of service employees and how negative emotions can change to a positive outcome in CX. The role of emotions in CX is challenged through the testing of the research propositions proposed by Manthiou, Hickman and Klaus (2020): does the role of negative emotions change with an interaction with a service employee? Can this change in emotion lead to positive behavioural outcomes such as satisfaction, trust and word of mouth? We undertook two quantitative questionnaires to explore the role of negative emotions and the role of a service employee in two service contexts; retail banking (utilitarian) and travel (hedonic). Data was collected from 543 participants. This research focuses on negative emotions in a service context and provides a future research agenda to advance our knowledge. We therefore add to the knowledge of emotions in CX by emphasising that emotions are not purely intrapersonal, since social interactions can influence an emotional experience. These findings advance our knowledge and understanding whilst offering practical managerial implications

The missing link - fairness as the ultimate determinant of service profitability

Fairness is widely considered a key driver of human behavior. Organizational behavior (OB) research focuses on fairness as an employee attitude driver. Marketing research highlights fairness perceptions as a key determinant of both purchase intentions and purchase behavior. Yet, to our best knowledge, no explicit attempt has been made to bridge the two phenomena. Using deductive reasoning and delineation methods, we posit that, through the diffusion of customer experience, value perception, attitudes, and behaviors, a symbiosis of OB and marketing research ultimately influences organizational performance. Our corresponding conceptual framework determines fairness perceptions’ influence on employee attitudes and service productivity by means of proposition development. In turn, this leads to an increase in customer satisfaction, consumer purchasing, and re-purchasing behavior, and – ultimately – profitability

Sustainable Management of Events in an Experiential Perspective

Events are complex value propositions that are realized by specialists to meet different leisure and entertainment needs. They are highly intangible and experiential experiential-type products (Pencarelli and Forlani 2016) to which the application of logical experience is particularly suitable (Bartolazzi et al. 2008; Shane and Patterson 2010; Manthiou et al. 2014; Getz and Page 2016). This chapter aims to describe the role played by events in the experience economy for territories involved in sustainable tourism strategies. The authors also propose a model for event impact analysis and evaluation. Starting from the idea that tourist destinations represent a stage on which tourism products can be displayed, so as to satisfy the demands of travelers seeking engaging experiences (Pencarelli and Forlani 2016), the importance of the role played by Destination destination Management management in managing the events is further underlined. Tourists searching such experiences want to be in the spotlight and co-participate with territorial players in the creation of value. As such, Event event Management management requires the use of tools such as planning, organization, and control in order to design, plan, and put on a balanced program of events while monitoring the impact on value creation for both tourists and regional stakeholders within the perspective of sustainability. This chapter proposes to redefine the experiential perspective of a set of indicators that are useful in holistically evaluating the performance of events in a traditional tri-faceted dimension, namely i.e., economic, social, and environmental