Research Topics on Immersive Speculative Environments & Futures Thinking
The rise of immersive speculative environments powered by virtual and mixed reality technologies marks a significant shift in how we engage with the concept of the future. Across the globe, new institutions—particularly the so-called “museums of the future”—are leveraging these tools to offer participants live, multi-sensory experiences that simulate possible futures. These environments blend storytelling, interactivity, and digital infrastructure to construct experiential futures that are both engaging and ideologically loaded. However, the full implications of these spaces for public participation in futures thinking and futures-making remain under-explored. This research initiative aims to examine the theoretical and practical contours of these emerging environments through an interdisciplinary lens.
The Technological Foundations of Immersive Speculative Environments
Immersive speculative environments depend heavily on cutting-edge technologies such as VR, AR, haptics, spatial computing, and AI. These technologies enable real-time interaction and dynamic scenario-building, forming the backbone of experiential futures. Research in engineering and HCI (Human-Computer Interaction) has explored the mechanics, but less attention has been paid to how these systems encode ideological, cultural, or political narratives within technical architectures. Understanding the technological affordances and limitations is essential to grasp their influence on shaping future imaginaries and to ensure these environments remain inclusive, accessible, and critically designed.
Narratives, Textuality, and Speculative Storytelling in Mixed Realities
The immersive nature of these speculative environments introduces new forms of textuality—non-linear, interactive, and embodied storytelling that often resists traditional narrative structures. These narrative systems function not just as entertainment but as speculative texts shaping how participants perceive and understand possible futures. This topic explores how the fusion of design fiction, speculative realism, and narrative theory is operationalized in these settings, and the ways in which narrative design choices frame what is thinkable, probable, or desirable in future scenarios.
Public Engagement and Critical Pedagogy in Immersive Futures
Museums of the future present not only technological spectacles but also pedagogical tools that shape public understanding of complex future-oriented issues such as climate change, AI governance, pandemics, or social collapse. Drawing on critical pedagogy, this research topic examines how immersive speculative environments can function as platforms for transformative learning and civic engagement. The focus is on how these spaces enable (or constrain) agency, reflection, and critical thought among diverse audiences, and how they might contribute to a more democratic futures literacy.
Power, Politics, and the Political Economy of Future-Making
As immersive speculative environments become increasingly commercialized and state-sponsored, questions arise regarding who authors these futures, who benefits from them, and what ideologies are embedded within them. This line of research investigates the role of corporate, governmental, and institutional actors in the design, funding, and framing of immersive experiences. It critically explores how economic imperatives, surveillance practices, and branding influence the kind of futures that are visualized and experienced—raising urgent concerns about digital colonialism, data extraction, and privatized imagination.
Towards a Conceptual Framework for Futures Studies
Given the interdisciplinary nature of immersive speculative environments, there is a pressing need for an integrated conceptual framework that allows researchers to systematically investigate their design, impact, and meaning. This topic proposes such a framework by synthesizing insights from engineering, humanities, psychology, and futures education. The framework incorporates dimensions of authorship, affordance, audience, agency, and accumulation to enable a comprehensive critique of immersive environments. It serves as a foundation for future empirical studies and policy recommendations aimed at ensuring these environments contribute positively to collective futures-making.
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