Virtual Reality as Shopping Environment

Product representations with virtual reality as well as augmented reality technologies can be controlled experimentally and are therefore ideal for market research studies. The question is, how does the purchase decision process in a virtual environment differ from online shopping on the one hand and shopping in a stationary retail store on the other? And how can the unique possibilities of the new technologies – such as adaptive decision support through search hints or superimposed additional information – be used even more effectively? In an interdisciplinary cooperation with scientists from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), the Cluster of Excellence Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC) at Bielefeld University, and marketing experts from the University of Southern Denmark, NIM investigated these and other questions.