Disentangling the impact of virtual experience on advertising outcomes through the lens of human-computer interaction

Abstract

Despite the rapid growth of advertising on short-form video platforms, the mechanisms through which virtual experiences influence advertising outcomes remain underexamined. Drawing from the human-computer interaction perspective, this study investigates the dynamic nexus between three psychological aspects of virtual experiences – immersion, perceptual realism, and entertainment – and advertising evaluation in the context of the TikTok app. The study explicitly considers the mediating role of advertising engagement in the relationship between these TikTok experiences and advertising evaluation. Using a dataset of 300 customers who frequently encountered TikTok advertisements, the PLS-SEM technique is employed to test the hypotheses. The results reveal that among the virtual experience dimensions, perceptual realism exerts the strongest effect on advertising engagement, followed by entertainment, while immersion has the least impact. Advertising engagement, in turn, positively affects advertising evaluation. Furthermore, the three dimensions of virtual experience significantly enhance advertising evaluation by fostering customers’ engagement with the short-form advertising videos on TikTok. These findings affirm the applicability of Human–Computer Interaction theory to the essential domain of short-form video platform promotion and provide in-depth insight into the process of creating engaging and favourably evaluated advertisements.