Exploring Human-Technology Interactions in Audio Mixed Realities

The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and immersive technologies has intensified interest in understanding how virtual and augmented environments influence human perception, cognition, and behavior. This thesis investigates the bidirectional dynamics between users and technology, with a specific focus on audio-based Mixed Reality experiences. Audio MR offers a powerful pathway to immersion, capable of reducing visual overload while introducing distinct challenges related to spatial presence and cognitive load. Within this context, personalization emerges as a central but ambivalent mechanism: while adaptive experiences may enhance engagement, excessive or opaque adaptation risks diminishing users’ sense of agency and autonomy. To address this complexity, the research adopts a novel analytical approach that is examined through three core dimensions —immersion, coherence, and entanglement— providing conceptual and methodological tools to analyse how human and adaptive systems mutually influence one another. The proposed approach is validated through an ecological, real-world experiment in which users interact with a virtual agent, driven by a machine learning algorithm, in an Audio Augmented Reality environment. To ground the research in a concrete social domain, the thesis applies these concepts to immersive storytelling for Cultural Heritage, exploring how audio-centric Mixed Reality experiences can enhance engagement, understanding, and accessibility for diverse audiences.