What did you expect

The development of immersive technologies has brought with it the need to redefine the concept of quality of experience (QoE). Studies have explored QoE in virtual reality (VR) by adopting a top-down approach—these are solely based on existing frameworks and theory and complemented with novel technical considerations. It can be argued that any QoE framework derived in this manner is limited, as its scope is fixed even prior to any data gathering process. To this end, the current study proposes a bottom-up approach, involving the user in the formulation of a broader QoE model. The repertory grid technique (RGT) was used to analyse and group 360 attributes, listed by participants as criteria they used in judging the quality of a VR experience. The advantage of RGT is that it has a holistic approach towards the interpretation of the user’s experience combined with the precision of quantitative analysis. The study resulted in a QoE model that consists of three main groups of attributes (i.e., user, content, and system). Furthermore, the analysis showed that participants listed attributes related to their experience and appraisal of VR, and to the content that they viewed. In contrast, very few system-related attributes were mentioned. Finally, the current study discussed the RGT methodology—and user-driven approaches in general—as a complementary research approach to create a comprehensive and practical QoE model.