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From technology to interaction: How ritual interaction drives participation intention in immersive digital
Dong Lu1, Hao Peng1, Tian Wang1
1School of Economics and Management, Sichuan Normal University, Chengdu 610101, China.
None:
Despite rapid advances in immersive technologies (AR, VR, and MR), many digital experiences struggle to sustain user participation. Prior research emphasizes technological realism while overlooking how structured interactions shape meaning-making and motivation. Drawing on interaction ritual chains (IRC) theory, this study introduces ritual interaction (RI)-comprising contextual elements, ritual symbols, scripted processes, and shared emotion-to examine its impact on participation intention. Using PLS-SEM, results show that RI influences participation through a sequential psychological process: it enhances immersion, which strengthens presence, ultimately driving participation intention. Immersion plays a more proximal role than presence. Moderation analysis indicates that experience type strengthens the effect of RI on immersion in culture-based, but not nature-based, environments. By shifting focus from technological affordances to interactional structure, this study highlights how structured interaction can motivate participation and informs the design of immersive systems while contributing to human-computer interaction and mediated social behavior research.
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