The Psychosocial Reality of Digital Travel: Being in Virtual Places

by Ingvar Tjostheim, John A. Waterworth

Overview

This open access book takes a fresh look at the nature of the digital travel experience, at a time when more and more people are engaged in online social interaction, games, and other virtual experiences essentially involving online visits to other places. It examines whether these experiences can seem real to the virtual traveller and, if so, under what conditions and on what grounds. The book unpacks philosophical theories relevant to the feeling of being somewhere, emphasising the importance of perception and being-in-the-world. Notions of place are outlined, based on work in tourism studies, human geography, and other applied social fields, with an aim to investigate how and when different experiences of place arise for the traveller and how these relate to telepresence – the sense of being there in another place through digital media. Findings from recent empirical studies of digital travel are presented, including a survey from whichthe characteristics of “digital travellers” are identified. A review of selected interactive design trends and possibilities leads to the conclusion, which draws these strands together and looks to the future of this topical and expanding field.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783030912727
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Publication date:	12/06/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	9 MB

About the Author

Ingvar Tjostheim, PhD, is Senior Researcher at the Norwegian Computing Center.

John A. Waterworth PhD, CPsychol. is a consultant, writer and researcher. He is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Informatics, Umeå University, Sweden.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction.- 2. Being somewhere.- 3. Feeling present in virtual environments.- 4. Visiting places.- 5. The reality of digital travel.- 6. When the virtual becomes real?

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“A common approach today in book-length human-oriented treatments of new digital technologies is to jump right in and start discussing issues as if there were no previous theoretical works worthy of systematic consideration. Tjostheim and Waterworth try another tack in The Psychosocial Reality of Digital Travel. Their text contains a careful selection of theoretical perspectives for the key issues they discuss. What a difference that makes! Their combination of theoretical insights with user studies and critical analysis makes for an excellent read. Reading this book can help further one’s own thinking with regards to the emerging new area of digital travel, as well as to virtual reality and presence research, place theory, the philosophy of perception, and a host of other related topics, in a way that can only happen when elements of theory, empirical work, and analysis support each other meaningfully.”

— Anders Hedman, Associate Professor, KTH Royal Institute ofTechnology, Sweden

“Can virtual travels become as attractive as real ones? In this insightful book, Tjostheim and Waterworth suggest that although a digital journey differs from a ‘physical’ one in many respects, it can be a rich and satisfying experience, provided that it enables the traveller to achieve a high sense of ‘presence’ – the feeling of ‘being there.’ However, as the authors convincingly show, creating presence is not just a technological challenge: imagination, expectations, and the story or narrative through which the traveller makes sense of the journey also play a key role.”

— Andrea Gaggioli, Professor, Director of the ExperienceLab, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy

“This book offers an original and informative interpretation of travel in the electronically permeated world in which we now live. I was particularly intrigued by the authors' development of the idea of behavioural outsideness as an aspect of digital experiences of place. Virtual travel may not be a substitute for visiting somewhere, but this book shows that the increasingly realistic 3D rendering of places in digital games and other tele-technologies does provide a powerful affirmation of actual travel experiences.”

— Edward Relph, Emeritus Professor, Department of Geography and Planning, University of Toronto, Canada