Nowadays, the most promising technologies are those laying in the category of computer-mediated reality. In light of the above, an increasing number of museums are seeking innovative solutions to better exhibit and communicate the tangible and intangible heritage they preserve, while engaging visitors in an educational yet leisure experience. In addition to learning outcomes, museums value emotions, fun, and meaning making ( Hooper-Greenhill, 2004).
Such profound change is conceptualized twofold, concerning both the shift from the old museology based on the positivism–behaviorist approach to the new museology based on a constructivist approach, and a change from a collection-centered to an audience-centered focus: while the traditional conception focused on the exposition and tended to direct visitors’ behavior throughout pre-determined paths, museum managers today are prone to explore visitors’ perspective in order to collaboratively build meaningful experiences ( Hooper-Greenhill, 2000 Simon, 2010). In addition to the external pressure, there was a change in perspective based on new epistemology for conceiving museums and the contamination with different disciplines, especially psychology and the social sciences. Ballantyne and Uzzell (2011) explain the audience-centered approach as a strategy that museums adopt in response to the decline in public funding, as well as to compete with other leisure services in engaging consumers. Such evolution is especially pushed by social, political, and economic pressures ( Ross, 2004 Bearman and Geber, 2008 Black, 2012). Furthermore, museums need to adapt themselves to the socio-cultural changes, by finding new ways to meet the emerging demands related to learning and enjoyment ( Black, 2005). In the last years, museums are becoming more audience-centered and such trend requires to consider the needs of the audience (the actual as well as the potential visitors) when planning activities and exhibitions ( Hooper-Greenhill, 2006). Information derived from applying AT on visitors’ experience highlight the value of technology as mediating tool between the museum mission and the visitor experience, considering the interaction between visitors’ characteristics, museum environmental dimensions, and technology’s features. To do so, a case study is presented: a qualitative research performed at the Ara Pacis Museum in Rome (Italy) to analyze the visitor experience of a tour that integrates augmented and virtual reality. The present contribution discusses the Socio-Cultural Activity Theory (AT) as a theoretical framework to conceptualize the museum visit as an activity mediated by the technology, and to better identify the factors shaping the interaction between the visitors and the technologies. In this regard, psychological research contributes to advance the scientific knowledge about psychological and social phenomena related to the visitor experience, as well as to design innovative technologies and future tourism services.
Specifically, psychology has affected the overall conception of museum and the visitors toward a more holistic vision of the museum experience as a complexity of memory, personal drives, group identity, meaning-making process, as well as leisure preferences. In recent years, the contribution of various disciplines and professionals (i.e., from marketing, computer science, psychology, and pedagogy) to museum management has encouraged the development of a new conception of museology.