From conscious choices to unconscious realities: Analysis of audience immersion levels in interactive films through EEG and immersion experience questionnaire

This study examines the effects of interactive films on the viewer's immersion experience in light of analyses conducted through physiological and self-report feedback. The aim of the study is to question how the agency status that interactivity provides to the viewer through the ability to make choices and manipulate the narrative affects the immersion compared to traditional, non-interactive forms of film viewing that position the viewer as a passive recipient. In this study, which is positioned within cognitive film studies and built on the experimental model from quantitative research methods, an EEG device was used to evaluate the effects of the interactivity on the film viewing experience through online (simultaneous) feedback, aiming to observe the unconscious/objective effects on the participants. And, in order to evaluate it through offline (post-experiment) feedback, the Immersion Experience Questionnaire for Film, Television and Video was used, aiming to reach the conscious/subjective feedback of the participants. The EEG data are composed of beta frequency coherence levels between the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and posterior parietal cortex (PPC); while the questionnaire includes the sub-dimensions of captivation, real-world dissociation, comprehension, and transportation. The findings obtained as a result of the comparison between the experimental group and the control group who watched the interactive (experimental) and non-interactive (control) versions of the film Black Mirror: Bandersnatch (2019) did not indicate a significant difference in terms of EEG and questionnaire data both in the total film experience and in different parts of the movie, except for the part of the film that included the first choice moment. On the other hand, certain correlations between EEG data and scale data provided insights into the interaction of cognitive and emotional processes in the immersion and the right-left hemisphere relationship, which is the physiological reflection of this interaction.