Call for paper: Special issue on Augmented Reality in Psychology & Marketing

Augmented Reality Creativity Customer Engagement

We invite authors to submit to our special issue "Disrupting marketing realities: The sensory, emotional and cognitive mechanisms transforming customer experiences with reality-enhancing technologies" (Deadline: March 15th 2021).

Consumers and firms have recently witnessed the emergence of a veritable ecosystem of reality-enhancing technologies. Most notably, Augmented (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), as well as the developing Mixed Reality (MR), are being embraced as disruptive consumer-facing technologies. Whether on readily available devices (e.g., smartphones, tablets) or futuristic headsets, AR, VR, and MR applications that promise to enhance customer experiences are emerging at a frenetic pace. For instance, consumers can now visualize product holograms in AR (IKEA), feel the precarious circumstances in refugee camps first hand through VR (UNICEF), or immerse themselves in digitally-physically blended dining experiences with MR (Le Petit Chef). At same time, social media platforms are increasingly relying on reality-enhancing technology to further bridge gaps between firms, consumers, and other consumers (e.g., Snapchat AR lenses or Facebook VR).

This special issue aims for a broad approach to understanding the psychological mechanisms and consequences of using reality-enhancing technologies in marketing. Topics of interest may include, but are not limited to:

How AR, VR, and MR reshape our understanding and conceptualizations of consumer behavior and decision making in the marketplace.
How the transformative potential or boundaries of marketing with reality-enhancing technologies can be determined by identifying each technology’s unique psychological mechanisms.
Unique styles of decision-making enabled by reality-enhancing technologies (e.g., contextualized in AR vs. escapist in VR) and resulting impact on consumer choice.
AR, VR, and MR’s potential to support consumer goals and self-control in increasingly hedonic and impulse-driven decision contexts.
The suitability of using AR, VR, and MR in different experience and decision contexts (e.g., reliving memories with VR vs. looking into the future with AR).
Consumer responses to the use of reality-enhancing technology for non-profit goals (e.g., as in the UK’s NHS AR campaign for donating blood)
The presence or influence of sensory overload from using reality-enhancing technologies
(In-) congruence effects between different sensory modalities (e.g., gestures, voice-commands, haptics, audio, smell) when using AR, VR, and MR.
Reality-enhancing technologies as drivers for consumer well-being (physical, economic, social, emotional, psychological)