Empirical Evaluations of Interactive Systems in Cultural Heritage

Abstract

An increasing number of interactive systems aim to enhance the user experience (UX) of visitors at museums, archaeological places and cultural sites. This paper presents a review of empirical evaluations of interactive systems in cultural heritage (CH) based on a systematically selected sample of 53 publications from 2012-2016. Empirical evaluations examine the degree an interactive system satisfies user goals and expectations and are inherently complex activities that require careful planning and selection of methods. The review reports on (a) interactive systems of CH in terms of: purpose, technology, cultural content and location of interaction and (b) methods of empirical evaluation in terms of: dimensions of UX, general approach, data collection and participants. The paper provides discussion, critique and outlook on issues including: extending the evaluation dimensions towards the cultural value and the essence of interactivity; placing more consideration on CH professionals; identifying new evaluation methods that balance qualitative results to evidence-based approaches.

2 | 1 | 2021 Consolidation

“…Learning is a complex construct difficult to measure since it deals with personal behavior and emotions, and as Brockmyer et al (2009) suggest, indirect measures of learning must be applied to assess the levels of engagement of players. These indirect measures in the archaeological field must take several other data into account as Koutsabasis (2017) suggests: from touristic numbers to scholastic results, and visitors' retention referable to the development of serious games project connected to a site or a museum, just to name a few. When it comes to the benefits of cultural heritage, as archaeologists, we know that this account cannot be calculated in terms of cash, but on a much larger scale, in reason of the productive assets generated by the activities that revolve around this particular type of resource and, I would add, in terms of public engagement: the most important economic calculation is the one that measures the wealth produced in terms that I would define 'intangible' and longer-term.…”

El potencial de las TIC para la interpretación y puesta en valor del patrimonio: la relación entre las TIC y la satisfacción de los visitantes a centros culturales

“…En su inicio, cuando comenzaron a aplicarse las TIC en el ámbito de patrimonio cultural, éstas estaban enfocadas a ser utilizadas por los profesionales del turismo, puesto que su principal objetivo era mejorar los procesos de digitalización y documentación de objetos y lugares de interés patrimonial, así como mejorar los procesos de conservación de este nuevo patrimonio (Koutsabasis, 2017), denominado patrimonio digital. El patrimonio digital es aquel que se genera directamente en formato digital, o bien a partir de un modelo analógico existente se crea su copia virtual.…”

An Integrated Model for Evaluation of Big Data Interactive Systems Under Uncertainty

“…For m obile applications, ed u cational system s, and agricu ltu re system s, they u sed the sam e heu ristics or scales w ith the sam e level of im portance for all criteria. The basic view in evalu ating interactive system s is em piricism [10]. Thu s, these kind s of evalu ations of T interactive system s are d om inant.…”

“…Form at ive evalu ation focu ses on u sability problem s, and su m m ative evalu ation evalu ates the effectiveness of the final d esign [13]. So, d evelopers are looking at m ethod s that can be u sed earlier w hen only an im m atu re d esign is available [10]. The em pirical u sability testing shou ld provid e objective d ata that is d ifficu lt and exp ensive.…”