Will Users Prefer Cultural Heritage Exhibition in Digital Twin? The Mediating Role of Perceived Authenticity under the Moderation of Individual Profiles

Digital twin techniques provide unprecedented opportunities in cultural heritage and museum exhibition services. As the techniques intersect with cultural heritage, a compelling question arises: whether users accept the new service with pleasure or show aversion to the technology. In this paper, we compare user attitudes towards digital twin exhibition and traditional physical exhibition through laboratory experiments. Drawing from the Stimulus-Organism-Response (SOR) theoretical framework, we incorporate perceived authenticity and individual profiles such as field experience and personality traits to explore the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions influencing user attitudes towards digital twin exhibitions. It showed that compared with traditional exhibition, users with low level of cultural heritage familiarity, agreeableness trait and openness trait would perceive less authenticity in digital twin exhibition, and in turn report more negative attitudes towards the exhibition. The findings contribute to a better understanding of the fusion of technology and cultural heritage from user's perspective and provide insights into technology-empowered services of cultural heritage and smart museums. Annual Meeting of the Association for Information Science & Technology | Oct. 25 – 29, 2024 | Calgary, AB, Canada.