Acceptance of Students and Teachers Regarding a Virtual Reality Tool for Teaching the History of Architecture and Urbanism

With the advancement and increasing accessibility of immersive technologies and metaverses, virtual reality (VR) emerges as a promising educational tool. This study aims to assess student acceptance of VR usage in history of architecture and urbanism classes. The methodology includes the display of a two-minute video that simulates an interactive class, where students, guided by the professor, don HMDs (Head-Mounted Displays) and move into a didactic discussion within a virtual space, interacting through avatars. Following the video, students respond to a questionnaire based on the UTAUT-2 model, designed to measure the acceptance of new information technologies. The results indicate a positive receptivity to VR, highlighting expectations related to academic performance and a significant hedonic motivation. The study provides quantitative evidence that the integration of VR into architecture curricula has the potential to be well received by students, significantly enriching the educational experience.