Gamification and Visitor Experience in Online Exhibitions

Online exhibitions have expanded access to museum and cultural content, yet digital access alone does not ensure meaningful participation. This raises questions about the inclusive potential of online museum environments. Although online exhibitions have considerable potential to provide diverse and engaging visitor experiences, many still function primarily as information-delivery platforms. Gamification has therefore been increasingly adopted to deepen visitor engagement; however, empirical evidence regarding its effects on the overall online exhibition experience remains limited. Drawing on the self-determination theory (SDT), flow theory, and expectation-confirmation model (ECM), this study examines how gamification influences visitor experience and revisit intention in online exhibitions. A comparative experiment was conducted with 443 participants, randomly assigned to a gamified or nongamified online exhibition. The results confirmed that the fulfillment of psychological needs positively influenced flow, which in turn shaped visitor satisfaction and revisit intention. Among the psychological needs, relatedness was the strongest predictor of flow, highlighting the importance of social and emotional connectedness in online exhibition experiences. Gamification significantly enhanced visitors’ psychological experiences, although the overall structural relationships among the major constructs remained consistent across both conditions. By fostering more active and connected forms of participation, gamified exhibition design may help museums translate expanded digital access into more meaningful and potentially inclusive participation. In particular, the strong role of relatedness suggests that relationally oriented gamification can provide an important design approach for supporting connection, involvement, and sustained participation in online museum environments.