Abstract. Mobile technologies such as multimedia guides (MMGs) are now an important part of the visitor experience in museums and other cultural spaces. We report the development of two scales to measuring visitors' museum experiences: the Museum Experience Scale (MES) and the Multimedia Guide Scale (MGS); these quantitative measures can helpfully complement qualitative information about visitor experience. A standard psychometric methodology was used in the development of these scales: from a large set of potentially relevant statements, 57 were chosen and 255 people rated a museum experience (102 of whom had used a multimedia guide). A Principal Components analysis yielded a four factor solution for the MES (Engagement, Knowledge/Learning, Meaningful Experience and Emotional Connection) and a three factor solution for the MMGS (General Usability, Learnability and Control, Quality of Interaction). Comparing respondents who used a MMG during their museum visit with those who did not, there was a significant difference on the Engagement component of the MES, with respondents who used a MMG being significantly more engaged. The other components of the MES did not show significant differences.

This paper reports on an empirical study that compares two sets of heuristics, Nielsen’s heuristics and the SMART heuristics in the identification of usability problems in a mobile guide smartphone app for a living museum. Five experts used the severity rating scales to identify and determine the severity of the usability issues based on the two sets of usability heuristics. The study found that Nielsen’s heuristics set is too general to detect usability problems in a mobile application compared to SMART heuristics which focuses on the smartphone application in the product development lifecycle instead of the generic Nielsen’s heuristics which focuses on a wide range of interactive system. The study highlights the importance of utilizing domain specific usability heuristics in the evaluation process. This ensures that relevant usability issues were successfully identified which could then be given immediate attention to ensure optimal user experience.

This paper elaborates the empirical evidence of a usability evaluation of a VR and non-VR virtual tour application for a living museum. The System Usability Scale (SUS) was used in between participants experiments (Group 1: non-VR version and Group 2: VR version) with 40 participants. The results show that the mean scores of all components for the VR version are higher compared to the non-VR version, overall SUS score (72.10 vs 68.10), usability score (75.50 vs 71.70), and learnability (58.40 vs 57.00). Further analysis using a two-tailed independent t test showed no difference between the non-VR and VR versions. Additionally, no significant difference was observed between the groups in the context of gender, nationality, and prior experience (other VR tour applications) for overall SUS score, usability score, and learnability score. Α two-tailed independent t test indicated no significant difference in the usability score between participants with VR experience and no VR experience. However, a significant difference was found between participants with VR experience and no VR experience for both SUS score (t(38) = 2.17, p = 0.037) and learnability score (t(38) = 2.40, p = 0.021). The independent t test results indicated a significant difference between participant with and without previous visits to SCV for the usability score (t(38) = −2.31, p = 0.027), while there was no significant differences observed in other components. It can be concluded that both versions passed based on the SUS score. However, the sub-scale usability and learnability scores indicated some usability issue.

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