“I kind of had an avatar switch” : the role of the self in
engagement with an interactive TV drama

Johns, A; Galpin, AJ; Meredith, JM; Glancy, M

Abstract

This paper reports results from a study which examined
viewers’ cognitive and affective responses to an interactive
TV drama. Ten participants were videoed interacting with
‘Our World War’ [1], and then interviewed about their
experience using the video playback as a retrospective
prompt. An interpretative framework was designed to guide
analysis by probing themes of narrative engagement
identified in previous literature. We report findings relating to five themes of engagement: cognitive, affective,
perspective taking, competence and autonomy, and
transportation. Our data adds to the existing literature on
interactive stories by highlighting the pivotal role of the self in engaging with interactive drama, with self-reflection emerging within each theme. We conclude that two experiential states drive engagement: a transported
experience; and one in which self-reflection limits transportation.

Citation

engagement with an interactive TV drama. Presented at TVX 2016: the ACM International Conference on Interactive Experiences for TV and Online Video, Chicago, United States

• Presentation Conference Type: Other
• Conference Name: TVX 2016: the ACM International Conference on Interactive Experiences for TV and Online Video
• Conference Location: Chicago, United States
• End Date: Jun 24, 2016
• Acceptance Date: Apr 12, 2016
• Publication Date: Jun 17, 2016
• Deposit Date: May 6, 2016
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 26, 2016
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/2932206.2932218
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2932206.2932218
• Related Public URLs: https://www.id.iit.edu/tvx2016/
• Additional Information: Additional Information : ISBN: 9781450340670; Event Type : Conference