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Oncioiu, I.; Priescu, I. The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations. Encyclopedia. Available online: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/21451 (accessed on 18 May 2024).
Oncioiu I, Priescu I. The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations. Encyclopedia. Available at: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/21451. Accessed May 18, 2024.
Oncioiu, Ionica, Iustin Priescu. "The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations" Encyclopedia, https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/21451 (accessed May 18, 2024).
Oncioiu, I., & Priescu, I. (2022, April 07). The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations. In Encyclopedia. https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/21451
Oncioiu, Ionica and Iustin Priescu. "The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations." Encyclopedia. Web. 07 April, 2022.
The Use of Virtual Reality in Tourism Destinations
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This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/su14074191

The role of new technologies in tourism is changing rapidly, leading to the development of customer relationships through the use of virtual reality in the marketing of tourist destinations. In addition to focusing on the influence of travel intentions that has prevailed in practice so far, the use of VR is expected to have an impact on the travel experience on the spot.

virtual reality tourism tourist destination digital transformation consumer behavior

1. Virtual Reality in Tourism—A New Level of Digital Evolution

In recent years, a number of technological advances have led to significant improvements in technology utilizing virtual reality because it is a technology and a term often used in tourism research and practice [1][2]. These developments are crucial due to the growing interest of tourists in technology. Various authors have dealt with the similarities and differences between augmented and virtual reality, suggesting that VR is often described as a concept related to augmented reality [3][4][5][6]. Other authors have presented VR as a visualization technique in which the real environment disappears completely, and the client is immersed in a completely digital world [7][8]. Some authors have also discussed mixed reality (virtual reality and augmented reality), which describes the combination of a real environment with digital content with the help of technical devices and can vary from the real environment without the complete digital immersion [9][10][11].
In contrast, VR is a fully computer-generated 3D environment that users can navigate and interact with using one or more of the five senses [12]. In fact, the reinvention of virtual reality destinations has become popular [13][14][15]. Every VR system requires an input device so that the actions of the potential tourist can be interpreted and with which they can interact in the virtual environment. In complete isolation, the potential tourist is holistic in the VR world and has no interaction with the real world. Understandably, there is an additional need for research and development to include a sense of balance, which is important, e.g., for determining posture and orientation in the room or telepresence [16], i.e., inclusion of the characteristics of physical immersion and psychological presence [17][18][19].
Many applications used in VR offer tourists access to reliable and accurate information with a fraction of the cost, time, and effort, which allows for the elimination of elements of uncertainty related to the intangible nature of products and tourist destinations [20][21]. According to Guttentag [22], especially in tourism, sensor technology is very important, and VR applications are widely used in this industry to create and plan models. They offer the opportunity to observe the surroundings from countless perspectives. Equally, VR-based marketing and, especially, advertising applications are usually addressed to several sensory organs of tourists. Thus, it is easier for advertisers to arouse the desire to relax, adventure, or explore, and VR offers the future tourist better opportunities to experience and sample the holiday destination and is, therefore, more effective than traditional print advertising.
VR provides more accurate information about interesting places to visit, but these destinations are perceived subjectively and differently by each person because users have the opportunity to use their own spatial perception to explore the world of VR in a natural way [23][24][25]. Moreover, “overtourism” can be counteracted with the help of VR as a virtual copy of the original in the case where a destination gives the visitor the opportunity to explore freely. The use of new technologies in destination marketing can help break down physical barriers through the virtual experience of destinations inaccessible to certain people who have limited opportunities or are unable to travel due to the pandemic.
All these aspects combined will contribute to the creation of the profile of the tourist who uses VR, to their motivation for choosing a tourist destination in a virtual way, and to the strategic planning in the marketing of tourist destinations. At the same time, all those involved must account for a number of factors, as follows:
  • Political factors relating to property rights;
  • Economic factors involved in changing business models or their innovations and marketing activities;
  • Sociocultural factors examining the behavior and market trends of consumers and tourists.
Another major aspect of VR technology in tourism is the potential change in tourism behavior and demand structure [26][27][28]. Specific market segments could consist of Generation Y and Generation Z—generations who prefer to use this technology to virtually select the destinations and accommodation providers they want to travel to directly from home [29]. However, for this target group, the integration of sensory perceptions (things that can be touched or felt) is one of the key aspects to fully develop the great potential of VR [30]. These generations also appreciate creating content for comprehensive physical immersion (animating a 3D environment or creating a 3D environment with the integration of photos and videos). Therefore, the use of VR technology in marketing strategy could influence the decision in favor of a certain destination and should attract new tourists or encourage existing tourists to consume more.
This business model, which is based on the principle of experimenting virtually with VR technology and subsequently purchasing, could become the business model of the future for the tourism industry. Due to the attractiveness and high potential for destination marketing, travel organizations have begun to use virtual worlds as a marketing tool.

2. Factors of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology and Behavioral Intention Model

The study of tourist behavior is a fascinating journey into the world of human behavior [11]. The main advantage for which the authors used the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model in this study lies in the fact that it allows for the investigation of the factors determining the adoption, acceptance, and use of new technologies and may also surprise the behavior of using that technology. Hence, the UTAUT model comprises many other theories such as the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA), Motivational Model (MM), Innovation Diffusion Theory (IDT), Model of PC Utilization (MPCU), Hybrid Model, and Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) and can be a valuable tool for examining the possible future of VR technology and its influence on destination marketing.
The UTAUT model used in this study was adjusted with the constructs set by previous researchers [31][32][33]. According to Venkatesh et al. [32], the four key constructs of UTAUT are social influence, effort expectation, performance expectation, and facilitating conditions. The expectation of performance is to ensure users’ increased competitiveness and tourism performance by adopting information technology. The waiting effort offered by the adoption of VR technology makes the choice of tourist destination more precise and faster for the realization of the targeted tourist activities. Social influence supports VR technology users to gain support in choosing tourist destinations with the help of social networks. The facilitation conditions speak about the assistance of current and potential tourists in using the VR infrastructure to carry out their visions on the selected tourist destinations more effectively. These constructs are motivated by behavioral intention to use VR technology and are moderated by the purchase intention of a tourist package, the (re)visit intention of a tourist destination, and usage interests’ VR technology as often as possible.
UTAUT factors (social influence, effort expectation, performance expectation, and facilitating conditions) could affect the behavioral intention of tourists to become aware of a tourist destination through VR technology. Thus, the use of VR by tourists is influenced by effort expectancy and performance expectancy. To make the VR experience as realistic as possible, it is necessary to ensure a real-world view. Videos or images are usually supplemented with additional computer-generated information or virtual objects by fading or overlapping.

2.1. Behavioral Intention

Since planning a vacation today cannot be imagined without quick access to information, to influence behavioral intent, tourism stakeholders should encourage their clients to adopt and use VR technology, providing knowledge about the benefits of using these tools by investing more resources in such technology and by developing incentive systems to motivate their adoption. However, few studies [34][18] have addressed the combined effects of VR marketing and social media presence on the (re)visit intentions of tourists in a destination marketing context. Moreover, many tourists evaluate their experience based on utilitarian and hedonic values, and these can help researchers understand tourism purchase behavior [35][36]. Thus, the tourist’s perceptions of value are characterized either by their hedonistic values or by their utilitarian values. The hedonic tourist appreciates the entertainment and emotional experience of the tourist destination, while the utilitarian tourist is rational, task-oriented, functional, and cognitive during VR experiences.
A number of studies investigating hedonic consumption behaviors in a virtual environment suggest that tourists consider meeting objectivity and subjective requirements, while utility tourists are more likely to consider the reality of a situation as a cognitive response [35][37]. Based on the above studies, this research operates in VR experiences related to tourism using concepts aimed at the behavioral intention to use this technology based on substructures, such as the intention to buy a tourist package, the intention to (re)visit the tourist destination, and interests in using VR technology as often as possible.

2.2. Social Influence

The abundance of online tourist data gives rise to new travel desires and needs, which, in turn, are (increasingly) bought or booked through the Internet [37][38]. The mobile site has become indispensable when it comes to traveling and travel planning, as smartphones can provide tourist information and knowledge from different destinations [39]. Therefore, social influence can have a vital influence on the user’s intention to accept and adopt technology in their life [40]. This is due to the fact that today, more and more people are very involved in social media and live their whole lives in the digital environment. Now, more and more tourism operators are using so-called “social influencers” to market their destinations directly on Facebook (based on the number of friends, photo tags, and wall posts), who are becoming active community multipliers for certain tourist destinations. As a result, social networks have a massive impact on the real world and, consequently, on tourism [41][42].

2.3. Effort Expectation

While communication between users on the Internet can take place frequently, briefly, and quickly, the provision of information through VR technology requires a greater effort on the part of the tourist. Previous research [43][44] suggest some aspects of effort expectancy: tourists should receive travel information in a friendly way, and in the next step, they should be given the opportunity to request additional information about the travel destination in real-time. The same researchers reveal that ease of use serves as a strong determinant of the acceptance of VR technology [45][46]. In this research, ease of use is defined as the possibility and frequency for the tourist to try or continue to use VR in the future when choosing a tourist destination. This includes not only the perceived ease of use, but also the complexity of interface design.

2.4. Performance Expectation

Perceived usefulness is the extent to which the user believes in the gain or return that the technology in question provides [47]. Perceived usefulness is one of the initial determinants of the technology adoption process [48]. Regarding VR applications in tourism, the hope of performance offers rewarding aspects; the adequacy is substantial and plays a very important role in their use [49]. Thus, the performance expectation of using VR technology is a notable factor among tourists. They consider that the expectation of performance is one of the main reasons for the adoption and use of disruptive technologies. Destinations need to react and educate users. Other than personality traits, perceived usefulness also affects how much information is disclosed by a user on VR. More attention should be paid to the quality and less to the amount of VR content so as not to discourage potential users.

2.5. Facilitating Conditions

The facilitation condition has a substantial influence on usage behavior [49]. The perceived ease of use of technology, telepresence and interactivity, opportunity to explore a particular destination, and facilitation of conditions, such as a substitute for a real trip, have a significant relationship with the presentation environment of the tourist destination with the help of VR technology [50]. Moreover, technical support and resources are considered facilitative conditions and positively influence the behavioral intention to adopt this technology.

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