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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Sec. Cognitive Neuroscience
Volume 18 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2024.1495845

Embodied Echoes: Navigating the Familiarity in Continued Intention to Play VR Game

Provisionally accepted
LING YANG LING YANG 1*DAIBO XIAO DAIBO XIAO 2*
  • 1 Xinhua College of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
  • 2 City University of Macau, Macao, Macao, SAR China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Virtual reality (VR) games, propelled by advancements in VR and artificial intelligence technologies, offer a level of realism and interactivity that traditional games cannot match. However, despite their immersive potential, VR gameshave not yet reached the widespread popularity of their conventional counterparts.While VR can craft the illusion of a parallel reality, users often remain cognizant of the delineation between the virtual and the real. In this paper, we employ a blend of qualitative and quantitative research methods to explore the impact of familiarity with virtual environments and interactive elements on users' sense of embodiment, flow experience, and their intention to continue playing VR games.Additionally, we examine the moderating influence of perceived cost within this framework. Our analysis of 307 collected responses, facilitated by PLS-SEM, reveals that familiarity with interactivity is positively associated with both sense of embodiment and flow experience, whereas familiarity with the virtual scene primarily influences sense of embodiment. Interestingly, perceived cost exerts a positive moderating effect on the relationship between flow experience and the intention to persist with VR gaming, while it negatively moderates the impact of sense of embodiment on this intention. This study offers theoretical insights that can guide future research in the domain of VR gaming, as well as practical takeaways for companies in the VR game industry, shedding light on how to enhance user engagement and sustain long-term interest in VR gaming experiences.

    Keywords: VR game, Sense of familiarity, Sense of embodiment, Continued Intention To Play, Perceived cost

    Received: 13 Sep 2024; Accepted: 28 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 YANG and XIAO. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    LING YANG, Xinhua College of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, 510520, Guangdong Province, China
    DAIBO XIAO, City University of Macau, Macao, Macao, SAR China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.