Understanding Augmented Reality Affordances for Travel Decision‐Making: A Mixed‐Method Study

ABSTRACT Consumers engaged in destination travel decision‐making must evaluate experiences they cannot directly inspect before purchase, creating a representational gap between abstract promotional information and lived spatial reality. Although augmented reality (AR) is increasingly used in consumer behavior, prior research has emphasized technological features rather than the perceived action possibilities that shape consumer judgment. Drawing on Affordance theory and the elaboration likelihood model, this research develops and tests an affordance‐based framework explaining how AR influences cognitive and affective evaluations in destination decision‐making. A sequential mixed‐method design was employed: Study 1 identified key AR affordances through in‐depth interviews with 29 consumers, and Study 2 surveyed 360 consumers using structural equation modeling. Results present that playfulness and vividness enhance hedonic attitudes, whereas interactivity strengthens utilitarian attitudes; both predict adoption intention. Technological proficiency does not moderate these relationships, while both informational and experiential application characteristics exert conditional effects. The findings advance consumer behavior theory by clarifying how immersive technologies reduce uncertainty in experiential decisions.