Comfortable Mobility vs. Attractive Scenery: The Key to Augmenting Narrative Worlds in Outdoor Locative Augmented Reality Storytelling

Title of the Paper

Comfortable Mobility vs. Attractive Scenery: The Key to Augmenting Narrative Worlds in Outdoor Locative Augmented Reality Storytelling

Paper Information

• Subject Area: Integration of augmented reality (AR) and storytelling, particularly the impact of outdoor path design and walkability on user experience.
• Keywords: Augmented reality, mixed reality, locative storytelling, walkability, user experience, path design, spatial presence, narrative immersion

Research Background and Problem

• Identified Problem or Challenge: While AR technology has made significant progress in indoor environments and game design, little research has explored how outdoor path design (e.g., walkability and path comfort) affects user experience in AR storytelling. Moreover, AR gaming applications (e.g., Pokémon Go) prioritize simplified navigation over the potential impact of the environment on users' narrative experiences.
• Significance: Understanding how environmental factors (e.g., comfort and visual appeal) influence user immersion and narrative connection is critical for designing more effective outdoor AR storytelling experiences.
• Research Motivation: Existing studies on environmental evaluation of AR narratives primarily focus on indoor or gaming contexts. The authors argue that for outdoor locative storytelling applications, path environmental factors significantly affect users' narrative engagement and immersive experiences.
• Related Work: Relevant research areas include user behavior analysis in AR gaming experiences, studies on the coherence of indoor narrative environments, and evaluation methods for walkable environments.

Proposed Solution

• Proposed Method or Solution: The authors propose a comprehensive method for evaluating outdoor environment walkability, using path walkability and narrative walkability as assessment metrics, and validate their impact on AR storytelling experiences through user experiments.
• Innovations:
  1. Introduced a walkability measurement model specifically for AR narrative experiences, considering physical path conditions and spatial consistency with narrative content.
  2. Quantified the impact of environmental factors (comfort and attractiveness) on users' narrative experiences for the first time.
  3. Combined narrative content with path design to propose effective design guidelines.
• Implementation Steps and Key Techniques:
  1. Assess path walkability metrics, including path attractiveness, comfort (e.g., shade and rest areas), and obstacles.
  2. Design experimental paths with high/low narrative walkability and high/low path walkability.
  3. Develop an AR application for locative storytelling, including navigation prompts and story scene video displays.
  4. Use questionnaires and GPS heatmaps to record users' narrative engagement, spatial presence, and perceived workload.

Research Findings

• Specific Findings:
  1. When path walkability is reasonably ensured, attractiveness factors (e.g., visual environmental elements) significantly enhance users' narrative engagement and spatial presence.
  2. Even in high narrative walkability environments, the absence of safe and comfortable mobility elements leads users to focus more on movement itself, hindering the integration of narrative content with the real environment.
  3. Proposed key environmental conditions for path design, such as ensuring comfort (rest areas, flat roads) and enhancing attractiveness (visual art, activity areas).
• Advantages Over Existing Solutions:
  • Provides targeted path design guidelines to ensure users can smoothly transition from mobility functions to narrative immersion in outdoor scenarios.
  • Offers quantitative metrics to better understand the relationship between walkability and narrative integration.
• Experimental or Evaluation Results:
  • In high narrative walkability paths, the correlation coefficient between visual attractiveness and narrative engagement reached r = 0.733.
  • In high path walkability environments, comfort showed a strong correlation with spatial presence (r = 0.705).
  • Attractiveness factors had weaker effects in low path walkability environments, while comfort factors were more critical.
• Limitations and Future Directions:
  1. This study primarily focused on architectural and temporal consistency, without considering other narrative background factors such as weather and seasons.
  2. Did not fully explore the impact of individual user differences on perceptions of comfort and attractiveness.
  3. The correlation with workload was relatively weak; future studies should include more complex tasks or expand evaluation scales.
  4. The study was based on a single story case and requires further validation in diverse settings and environmental conditions.