# Predictors of Engagement in Virtual Reality Storytelling Environments about Migration
## 6 Discussion  
The aim of this study was to investigate the predictors of engagement in VR, particularly the influence of immersion, presence, agency, usability, and user experience on engagement when people use a VR migration storytelling scenario. The analysis was carried out by applying the PLS-SEM technique. The results show that the model explains 55.2% of the variance in engagement because immersion, presence, agency, usability, and UX positively affect engagement. Immersion is one of the factors influencing engagement in VR migration storytelling scenarios. According to our model, this construct has a positive and significant effect on engagement (\(p\) = 0.015), thus supporting the H1 (the sense of immersion in the VR storytelling environment has a positive and significant effect on engagement). This result confirms the findings of previous studies that noted the positive effect of immersion on engagement [23; 36]. An interpretation of this result might be that the level of immersion created by an immersive storytelling scenario is effective in increasing engagement. This result also has implications for developers of VR storytelling scenarios because the provision of more interactions, realistic objects, sounds, and visual effects that increase immersion are effective in increasing the level of engagement. However, immersion had a small and negative effect size (q\({}^{2}\) = \(-\)0.0198), which might indicate that the magnitude of the relationship between immersion and engagement can be reduced. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c} \hline \hline
**Endogenous Variables** & **Stone-Geisser’s(Q2)** \\ \hline Engagement & 0.445 \\ Presence & 0.053 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 4: Stone-Geisser’s Q2 measure for predictive relevance of the structural model. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c} \hline \hline  & **Engagement** \\ \hline Immersion & \(-\)0.0198 \\ Presence & 0.0036 \\ Agency & 0.1243 \\ Usability & 0.0378 \\ UX & 0.0559 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 5: Values of the q\({}^{2}\) effect size. Another predictor of engagement in VR migration storytelling scenarios is presence. In this study, we have found that the sense of presence in the VR storytelling environment has a positive and significant effect on engagement (H2) with \(p\) = 0.002. In accordance with the present results, previous studies have demonstrated that the boundaries and features of VR scenarios make presence a factor that positively influences engagement [21; 22; 54; 51]. The effect size of the relationship between presence and engagement was small (q\({}^{2}\) = 0.0036). A possible interpretation of a small effect size might be that the VR storytelling environment does not include embodiment [81], so the sense of presence can decrease. Although the effect size is small, the relationship between presence and engagement is significant; therefore, the sense of presence experienced by the participants is relevant to engaging them in a VR storytelling environment. From a theoretical point of view, this result might be explained by the levels of empathy developed around the VR storytelling experience. In that regard, [PERSON] [12] found that cognitive processes that involve the sense of presence determine how people feel empathy and engagement with a story in VR. At this point of the discussion of results and by contrasting previous literature on the sense of presence, the effect of presence on engagement might be moderated or mediated by the levels of empathy created around the storytelling experience in VR. However, further research is needed to confirm this hypothesis. In this study, we found that agency was also a predictor of engagement (H3--the sense of agency in the VR storytelling environment has a positive and significant effect on engagement) with \(p\) < 0.000. The effect size was medium (q\({}^{2}\) = 0.1243). To the best of our knowledge, our study is the first one that provides insights into the positive effect of agency on engagement in VR.