Hierarchy of Needs in Immersive Theatre [BEGINNING THE EXPERIENCE] 2/3
Once your audience has begun the immersive experience, there are psychological needs that must come into play so your audience follows the story in the most optimal way.
- Belongingness and Love needs: friendship, intimacy, trust and acceptance, receiving and giving affection and love. Affiliating, being part of a group (family, friends, work).
Each audience member needs to have a sense that they belong in the experience and in the story. In some experiences, this need is only met by the lucky few who are following the right character or event, or know where the characters are in the space. Similar to User Experience, every single audience member must be given the space to belong within the design of the story, and it must be designed for them. This can be accomplished in smaller scale experiences where you create a track for each audience members flow so that every person is being considered, and that no matter where they are, they are engaging in some part of the story (and if not, designing a way to direct them to an active part of the space). In a larger scale experience, this could include being part of a group that has purpose instead of a flock of sheep. KPOP did this successfully by designing the show around the audience as focus groups for a Korean Pop Music Factory wanting to understand how to be more successful in the American Pop Music Industry. Each group has a direct relationship with what was happening, whether they were being engaged directly (being asked focus questions) or simply watching (while a scene or performance plays out as if they are visitors or concert attendees). Either way, the audience had a purpose by being given some sort of role within the world. This also made space for each individual to feel that they were important within the group, while still given the space to interact or observe based on their comfortability (active or passive engagement). Create activities throughout the experience that can be done as a group or even with other audience members. These types of experiences, although tricky to get people to engage in, can have the strongest impact. What is key is to establish trust within the space so that your audience feels comfortable engaging in a way they might not do in real life. If someone engages with a character, or even better, another audience member, they are committing to the story and able to feel safe through working together, and this is known to be a very rewarding experience for humans.
A subset of belonging within a social group is the element of the “herd mentality.” When the audience sees someone doing something or going somewhere, they now see it as possible or accepted. If a character engages with the audience in some way and even one person engages, immediately the tension is released and other audience members might feel more permission to engage. Explore how you can use this to your advantage within an experience in terms of flocking and tracking as well as engaging with characters and making choices.
The other element of this need is love, which relate to relationships from character to character, character to audience, and audience to audience.
Michael Shurtleff’s Guideposts, based on Michael Shurtleff’s book, Audition, are a great key into understanding relationships and events within a story that create three-dimensional experiences for both the actors and the audience. The first guidepost is finding the love within a scene. So when the audience enters into the space, ask yourself, “where is the love? The presence of love, the absence of love, betrayal of love etc.”
If you want to bring the audience into the world and the story, the audience is simply another character in the story, even if they are ghosts or spectators like in Sleep No More (passive engagement) or actively led by characters like in Then She Fell (active engagement). But if humans don’t know how to identify someone in the story, they don’t trust them or care about them, or both, and it makes it very hard for an audience member to give any love or attention back to the story or characters. There has to be a tether between the performers and the audience that strings them along. This can be accomplished if the story is designed where the character needs something from the audience, either physical or emotional. If a character respects the audience and takes care of them versus alienating them with aggression or hate, the audience’s psychological need is met so that they can engage deeper into the story.
Different characters can also be designed to create different relationships with certain groups or audience members, which is also a great way to split up groups into smaller groups while gaining a unique perspective into the story while maintaining a safe and trusting environment to live within. We will call this the “white rabbit” effect, where the audience is Alice and based on how the story is designed will follow a certain character for a period of time, creating a relationship with their narrative within the macrocosm of the story itself.
2) Esteem needs: (i) esteem for onself through achievement, mastery, or independence, and (ii) respect from others through status or prestige.
Self-esteem translates to offering your audience something to achieve. If there is a task that you employ your audience with inside the narrative, they will have the opportunity to earn another experience, perhaps something that is a one-on-one interaction with a character, an unlocked experience that others might not experience, or a secret room. While you can do this arbitrarily by having a character pull someone random away into a secret experience, there is an opportunity to allow the audience to earn it. This sense of independence within the story might need to be designed after the audience has established an understanding of the world and the characters (which is a Cognitive Growth Need), or perhaps the entire experience is surrounded by the opportunity to earn and unlock the next experience in a more interactive, gamified experience.
Self-esteem is also important throughout the experience because the audience needs a sense of confidence to progress in the experience. If you make them feel awkward, stupid, confused, or angry, they will distance their selves and replace it with their ego as a defense mechanism against further attacks on their sense of being. How can you give them the tools to feel independent and confident within the experience?
Recognition from others translates to awarding your audience. If the audience helps a certain character achieve a task or chooses to have a more active role in the experience, they are offered the chance to have a certain amount of status within the experience. While achieving a task gives self-recognition and a sense of achievement, being able to unlock an experience or progress based on their achievements is where awarding an audience member is a great device to establish a sense of esteem. Humans love awards. This is again inspired by the world of the gamification of an experience, but can be applied on a smaller scale to a more performative immersive experience. Perhaps the characters can instill prestige onto an audience member who has earned it, or perhaps someone who needs it. Or perhaps the group is offered a new sense of respect or prestige by accomplishing something within the story, and as a whole are rewarded by a character that they have followed, or a character that has been on our side throughout the experience. Referring back to the Love Need, the audience could offer recognition to an active or passive audience member within the narrative if they have performed or achieved something in the experience, either for the benefit of the group or character. Awards can be emotional or physical, or in the best cases, both.
Similar to positive reinforcement, humans need a signal that they are on the right track. Not doing so leads their minds to doubt or distrust in the experience. If you design a way to encourage the audience and give them an opportunity to gain esteem and respect from others (the audience and/or characters), your audience will be in a much more receptive state within the experience.
