Actually in the cinema: A field study comparing real 3D and 2D movie patrons' attention, emotion and film satisfaction

While 3D movies and fantasy film genre rise in popularity, the empirical exploration of viewers' cognitive and emotional engagement with film is currently limited and entirely derived from laboratory based studies of small samples. This study investigated the effect of stereoscopic realism (3D effect) on viewers' attention, emotion and satisfaction by collecting data from 225 cinema patrons who were leaving the movie theatre having just viewed Thor. The viewers from the 3D condition rated their experience as more perceptually realistic and reported being less distracted during the film than their 2D counterparts. Yet no significant group differences were observed in self-reported emotional arousal or satisfaction with the whole experience. Further analysis revealed that perceptual realism was a better predictor of viewer satisfaction than emotional arousal. We consider the idea that these findings may be a function of the fantasy genre and call for researchers to extend this line of study.