Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 416

4th International Conference on Culture, Education and Economic Development

of Modern Society (ICCESE 2020)

The User Experience Research of Theme Park APP

A Case Study of Shanghai Disney Resort*

Xiaowen Hu
School of Management
Northwest Minzu University
Lanzhou, China

Shengpeng Wang Yi Li
School of Management School of Management
Northwest Minzu University Northwest Minzu University
Lanzhou, China Lanzhou, China

Abstract—With the development of internet techniques and universality of associated apps along with mobile
adoption of mobile devices, touristic APPs becomes more and technology, there is a need to explore the experience of
more popular, yet few research focused on tourists' on-site tourism-related apps.
experience and perception with these APPs. Data was collected
through online reviews in Apple’s store. Word frequency II. LITERATURE REVIEW
analysis and sentiment analysis were applied to identify the
most mentioned issues and overall emotion of SDR APP. The A. Apps use experience
findings unearth time management is the key point to improve Patients’ experiences of using real-time application
tourists’ experiences while basic functions of APP cause becomes popular in medication monitoring industry(Broglia,
negative perception of APP. Practical implications for E., Millings, A., & Barkham, M. 2017; Olalla, J., de Lomas,
government, operators and theme park managers are provided J. M. G., et.al. & Stachowski, J. P.,2019; Lindgreen, P.,
to create more value from tourism related APPs. Lomborg, K., & Clausen, L.,2018; Donald, A., Cizer, H.,
Finnegan, N., Collin-Histed, T., Hughes, D. A., & Davies, E.
Keywords: Shanghai Disney Resort APP, word frequency H. ,2019).Methods include in–depth analysis and two-arm
analysis, sentiment analysis, user experience
nonrandomized design to observe patients’ acceptability of
I. INTRODUCTION related mobile app and their well-being. Some studies
highlight the significance of this mobile health technology
With the increasing development of internet techniques (e.g.Choet.al., 2019; Donald, A., et.al., 2019), while some
and rapid adoption of mobile technology, smartphone users trial reviews no significant differences (Olalla, J.et.al.2019).
have enabled users to read, search and negotiate daily, which
led to a radical social transformation (Ofcom, 2019). B. App use in tourism
Compared with other industries, the adoption of mobile Tourism industry has the nature of complexity (Faulkner
telephone and its apps are more ubiquitous in tourism & Russell, 1997; Zahra & Ryan, 2007) and at least four
industry(Dickinson et.al, 2014). These mobile devices and major sectors are included in this domain: hotels, restaurants,
apps have been utilized for various purposes to significantly transportation and destinations/attractions (Deuschl, D,2006),
affect tourists’ experience and potential purchase behavior as and some studies have investigated in research areas of
well as fundamental relationship between time- and-place- hotels, restaurants and transportation(e.g. Wang, D., Xiang,
related travel patterns(Dickinson, Ghali, Cherrett, Speed, Z., Law, R., & Ki, T. P. ,2016; Sun, Z., Wang, Y., Zhou, H.,
Davies, & Norgate, 2014; Ghaderi, Hatamifar, & Jiao, J., & Overstreet, R. E.,2019; Guptaet.al., 2007; Ozturk
Ghahramani, 2019; Wang & Fesenmaier, 2013). As a salient et.al, 2016; Yang & Leung, 2018).
part of comprehensive experience, utilization of tourism-
related apps may influence the whole tourists’ experience. As a significant component of tourism attraction, the
Nevertheless, few current studies explore the touristic user sustainability of cultural heritage in tourism attracts some
experience of apps. Given the rapid adoption and growing researchers’ attention. Some augmented Reality Tourism
Systems are developed via a smartphone-based platform to
*Fund: Supported by program for: (1)Scientific Research Project in enhance tourists’ experiences and protection of heritage (e.g.
Institutions of Higher Learning, which is provided by department of
education of Gansu province in P.R. China (Project No.2019B-28);
Gomez-Oliva et.al., 2019; Shihet.al., 2019; Suet.al., 2019).
(2)Innovation Team Cultivation Project, which is provided by Northwest However, on-site touristic experiences with the use of
Minzu University(Project No.31920190031); (3)Gansu Social Science
Planning Project, which is provided by Gansu Province(Project
technology still need more research (Kirova & Vo Thanh,
No.YB011).

Copyright © 2020 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license -http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. 383
 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 416

2019). With mixed research methods including an TABLE I. SAMPLE OF ONLINE REVIEW ON SDR REVIEW FROM
APPLE’S STORE
ethnographic approach, leisure experience narratives, and
phenomenological interviews, Kirova and Vo Thanh # online review content
revealed the key role played by smartphone that tourists’ 1
Rely on this app，we can know all the queue time to know
experience can be enhanced through hedonic and relational where you go next. It was very useful.
use of app in theme park. I want to create a new account, but why can't I receive my
mobile phone verification code?
Despite the meaningful contribution of these studies, I don’t know why, I have tried it several times and uninstalled
2
little research identifies the touristic related app use by user and reinstalled it, but it didn’t work.
But I need to get a quick license from this app ,so How do I play
generated contents. To narrow this gap, our study aims to in SDR?
understand the tourists’ perception of smartphone apps and I Can't register now. It’s hard for you to register. I hope to solve
3
their emotions. it soon.
4 Wish everyone a magical day.
III. METHOD 5 It really helps to arrange a queue waiting time reasonably.
6 Why can't I register for an account?
A. Background Can I book a ticket on this app? Why can't I find reservation
7
As a world-famous company providing tourism products information?
for theme parks, Disney opened its Shanghai Disney Resort Awesome!It includes real-time queuing information, maps of the
park.
(SDR) on 16th, June, 2016 to welcome customers. As the 8 The best thing is that you can directly get free fast passes, which
second largest theme park in China, the tickets of SDR were are convenient.
sold out in just a few hours after being available online Tickets can also be purchased directly. Give it a like.
(Zacks, 2016).Due to its wide popularity in China, more and 9
This software is pretty good because it will show instantly how
more tourists visit SDR, which induces a crowd problem ( La long to queue, which is very instructive for visiting SDR.
Jolla, 2017).Therefore, analysis of the tourists’ perception by
collecting reviews of the SDR app will provide an In our research, we apply word frequency analysis and
appropriate data source. sentiment analysis. Word frequency analysis(WFA) is a
significant research method to analyze and reveal important
B. Big data words in bibliometrics (Liu, Y., Wang, Y., & Li, M.,2017).
User-generated content (UGC), which is also called Big The basic principle of WFA is to determine the hotspots and
Data, has the nature of volume, velocity, variety, variability their changing trends by analyzing the frequency of the
and volatility (Power, 2015), and increasing attention has words appearing in the text. The online reviews of SDR app
been attracted by more and more researchers and business were collected and ROST Content Mining software was
operators (Miahet.al., 2017). Compared to traditional applied to analyze word frequency to show the tourists’ real
research methods (e.g., questionnaire surveys and perception of Shanghai Disneyland APP and their touristic
interviews), its comprehensive and effective characters experiences when they visit the SDR.
provide a better approach to explore some important issues Emotion is an important aspect of human beings, and
in tourism related research including tourist perception and understanding and analysis of emotion is critical in data
emotion (Liu et.al., 2019). mining (Cambria, 2016). This method shows users' various
C. Data collection and processing emotional perception of the SDR APP, which is helpful to
The main data source in our research is online customers’ market prediction and marketing implication.
reviews of Shanghai Disney APP, which is available on IV. DATA ANALYSIS
Apple’s app store. By collecting data manually, there are a
total of 1089 online reviews in the three years since the APP A. Word frequency analysis (WFA)
was developed from 2016 to 2018. After screening out all the "Table II" shows high-frequency words. First, analyze
reviews, we culled some unrelated data, and the total number the part of the speech of high-frequency feature words.
of final sample data available is 626. The samples of online Nouns mainly include 'time', 'software', 'projects' , 'paradise',
review on SDR review from Apple’s store are as shown in 'functions', etc., with the largest number, accounting for
"Table I". 38.6 % of the total; the number of verbs are second, within
35.7 % of the total, mainly including 'queue', 'register', 'wait',
'help', etc., which show users' use of the Shanghai
Disneyland APP Activities and behavioral characteristics;
adjectives include the feeling of the app when tourists travel,
including 'convenient', 'practical', 'fun', 'detailed', accounting
for 24.3 % of the total.
From the 10 most frequently used words, "time” is the
word most frequently mentioned by tourists, reflecting the
most important function of the SDR app. To make better use
of time and improve efficiency is the biggest perception of
SDR APP, which enhances tourists' positive experiences. As

384
 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 416

a kind of " software ", the nature of Shanghai Disneyland all the comments of SDR APP, 60.86% were positive, while
APP is a vocabulary mentioned by many users; the third- 16.93% was negative.
ranked adjective 'convenience' and the eighth-ranked
adjective 'practical' is the precise satisfied evaluation of the TABLE III. SENTIMENT ANALYSIS OF HIGH-FREQUENCY WORDS
app and the overall experience of the user using the app; Positive emotions 381 Articles 60.86%
'queue' and 'project' shows the crowed problem of SDR that Neutral emotions 139 Articles 22.20%
profoundly impact on tourists, and these two words also Negative emotions 106 Articles 16.93%
reflect that this APP relatively solves a part of the queuing The statistical results of the positive emotion segmentation are as
problem; the fifth-high-frequency word is 'register'. It is the follows:
Fair (0-10) 194 Articles 30.99%
biggest problem that users encounter when using the
Moderate (10-20) 109 Articles 17.41%
Shanghai Disneyland APP. From the collected comments, Height (above 20) 78 items 12.46%
users of this APP sometimes cannot receive the verification The statistical results of the negative emotion segmentation are as
code when registering an account and the single registration follows:
method makes users dissatisfied. The words " expecting " Fair (-10-0) 88 Articles 14.06%
and " playing " can reveal that the appearance of the APP, to Moderate (-20—10) 12 1.92%
Height (below -20) 5 bars 0.80%
some extent, led to more passion for the tourists' coming visit
experience.
As "Table III" shows, the number of general positive
TABLE II. PART OF HIGH-FREQUENCY WORDS OF ONLINE REVIEW OF emotions in overall positive emotions is higher than the other
SDR APP two parts, accounting for 30.99%. For example, "the waiting
time can be arranged reasonably; ok, you must go to Disney”;
# words frequency # words frequency
“the waiting time for each item is accurate." Similarly,
1 time 137 23 connection 16 according to statistics of negative emotions, the number of
2 Software 86 24 account 15 general negative emotions is higher than other parts,
3 Queue 80 25 facility 15 accounting for 14.06%. Comments such as "The overall is
4 Register 68 26 question 14
not bad, but the last time I played Flying Leap Horizon
showed 120 minutes in line but I waited there three hours”;
5 Item 59 27 version 14
“This APP keeps crashing unexpectedly. What’s going on?”;
6 Paradise 54 28 open 14 "Why is this app (supplied for Chinese tourists) designed in
7 Practical 49 29 service 13 English?" These results show that its function does
8 Function 40 30 fast 13 efficiently meets tourists’ demand of time management and
9 Look forward to 39 31 set 13
enhance visitors’ touristic experiences. However, the biggest
shortcomings of APP are problems such as quitting
10 Play 38 32 invalid 13
unexpectedly, difficulty in registration, and insufficient user-
11 Mobile 37 33 interface 13 friendly interface and interaction, which causes negative
12 Map 34 34 accurate 13 experiences during travel in SDR.
13 Shanghai 31 35 reasonable 13
V. CONCLUSION
14 Verify 31 36 tickets 12
The biggest overall image perception of the Shanghai
15 Required 31 37 happy 12
Disneyland APP by users is high-frequency words such as
16 Wait 26 38 mailbox 12 "time", "convenience", and "practical", so that they can get
17 Help 25 39 timely 12 map guidance for the app, save time, improve play efficiency,
18 Disney 25 40 park 11 and be useful for travel strategies The evaluation of the
19 Fun 23 41 position 10 certification and other evaluations; on the other hand, the
overall image perception is high-frequency words such as
20 Place 22 42 attraction 10
"registration" and "verification". The biggest problem in
21 Application 20 43 garden 10 obtaining the APP is that it cannot receive the verification
22 Arrange 19 44 choice 10 code and cannot register.
23 tips 18 45 pass 10
From the results of sentiment analysis, users still have a
24 character 18 46 special 9 positive attitude toward Shanghai Disneyland APP software
25 create 17 47 pleasure 9 and relatively negative attitudes. For the developers of the
26 friend 17 48 super 9 Shanghai Disneyland APP, the advantages of the APP in the
27 junk 17 49 artifact 9 eyes of users should be maintained and improved.
28 essential 16 50 prepared 9 Meanwhile, developers should pay close attention to every
negative comment and try to solve the problem existing in
B. Sentiment analysis the APP.
Sentiment analysis is the process of analysis, processing, From the analysis of online reviews commented on by
deduction, and inference on certain text. Table 3 shows tourists, map navigation and display of waiting time for
sentiment analysis of online reviews of the SDR app. Among various amusement facilities are the special features of the

385
 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 416

SDR APP, but the difficulty in registration and logging in is and Official Account, and to official websites for marketing
the biggest problem in the utilization of its APP. Based on promotion.
users' feedback, a more complete development of the
Shanghai Disney App should be promoted to maximize the D. Limitation and further research
revenue of Shanghai Disneyland. As the Shanghai Disney Resort is still in the booming
stage, and new products may frequently appear and the
A. Account registration difficulties version of APP is updated quickly, so there may be a
At the national level, mobile Internet technology should limitation when collecting data. In addition, the evaluation of
be developed to increase mobile communication capacity APP quality performance relies heavily on some indicators
and increase mobile Internet transmission rates. Wireless including compatible adaptation rate, activation time, CPU
network coverage of various scenic spots and theme parks in usage, and memory usage. Therefore, some negative reviews
China needs to be significantly improved to provide free published online may be caused by insufficient performance
WiFi, so that functions of navigation, query, booking and of some tourists' smartphones, instead of the SDR APP itself.
other activities will be applied more conveniently. Moreover, our research is based on the data collected online
reviews of SDR APP. Some other data may be used to
At APP operator level, more registration methods should identify more problems with touristic APPs.
be involved, such as mailbox registration, WeChat
registration, and direct login by using other famous website Future research may consider some other data sources
accounts. The website administer system needs to be and research methods to gain further insights about this area.
improved to improve customer service quality in order to Moreover, more special professional talents should be
reply to doubts and give guidance. Then the frequency of cultivated to promote tourists' and users' experience.
communication between operators and tourists will be higher
and it helps to imply marketing tactics and gain trust.
B. App interaction REFERENCES
It is needed to keep the balance between rich mobile [1] Liu, Y., Wang, Y., & Li, M. (2017). An empirical analysis for the
applicability of the methods of definition of high-frequency words in
functionality and a streamlined interface, streamline the word frequency analysis. In Digital Library Forum (Vol. 9, pp. 42-49).
content page and pop-up card-like presentations of [2] Wang, D., Xiang, Z., Law, R., & Ki, T. P. (2016). Assessing hotel-
unnecessary information, and use navigation settings to related smartphone apps using online reviews. Journal of Hospitality
organize or recognize overly detailed information to show Marketing & Management, 25(3), 291-313.
brief information. [3] Cambria, E. (2016). Affective Computing and Sentiment Analysis.
IEEE Intelligent Systems, 31(2), 102-107.
Virtual community entrance navigation needs to be set to
[4] Cho, H., Flynn, G., Saylor, M., Gradilla, M., & Schnall, R. (2019).
allow users to enter the community in real time to participate Use of the FITT framework to understand patients' experiences using
in interactions, such as reviews, travel notes, quizzes, a real-time medication monitoring pill bottle linked to a mobile-based
companions, etc. to open up a new model for user interaction. HIV self-management app: A qualitative study. International Journal
of Medical Informatics, 131, 103949.
C. Other problems [5] Communications Market Reports. (2019, Ofcom.
It is important to add the function of emergency message https://www.ofcom.org.uk/research-and-data/multi-sector-
research/cmr
notification to prevent tourists from missing important events.
Every facility in the SDR does not have an impressive [6] Dickinson, J. E., Ghali, K., Cherrett, T., Speed, C., Davies, N., &
Norgate, S. (2014). Tourism and the smartphone app: Capabilities,
introduction and cannot be understood literally. It is emerging practice and scope in the travel domain. Current Issues in
recommended to add videos or more pictures or people's Tourism, 17(1), 84–101.
comments so that tourists can easily understand each [7] Disney Shanghai Theme Park's Opening Day Tickets Sold Out |
recreation facility, so it is more convenient for tourists to Nasdaq.2016. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/disney-shanghai-
decide whether to play or not. In addition, it is necessary to theme-parks-opening-day-tickets-sold-out-2016-03-29
add a complaint suggestion function so that users can reflect [8] Faulkner, B., & Russell, R. (1997). Chaos and complexity in tourism:
the problems in the park in a timely and effective way. In search of a new perspective. Pacific tourism review, 1(2), 93-102.
Meanwhile, the timely number of visitors per day in SDR [9] Ghaderi, Z., Hatamifar, P., & Ghahramani, L. (2019). How
smartphones enhance local tourism experiences? Asia Pacific Journal
can be displayed in the APP during peak hours, so tourists of Tourism Research, 24(8), 778-788.
can go somewhere else to steer clear of rush hours. [10] Gomez-Oliva, A., Alvarado-Uribe, J., Parra-Meroño, M. C., & Jara,
Although this APP was developed for public use in 2016, A. J. (2019). Transforming Communication Channels to the Co-
Creation and Diffusion of Intangible Heritage in Smart Tourism
its publicity effort was not enough. Therefore, the majority Destination: Creation and Testing in Ceutí (Spain). Sustainability,
of tourists knew little about the SDR APP or even did not 11(14), 3848.
know that SDR APP. Meanwhile, more distributions of the [11] Gupta, S., McLaughlin, E., & Gomez, M. (2007). Guest Satisfaction
download of SDR APP are still needed. Major mobile phone and Restaurant Performance. Cornell Hotel and Restaurant
communication operators and APP stores of various mobile Administration Quarterly, 48(3), 284-298.
phone manufacturers can be utilized. Make full use of [12] Important Tips for Visiting Shanghai Disneyland. (Sep.8, 2017). La
popular public platforms such as forums, Weibo, WeChat Jolla Mom.
[13] Broglia, E., Millings, A., & Barkham, M. (2017). Comparing
counselling alone versus counselling supplemented with guided use

386
 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 416

of a well-being app for university students experiencing anxiety or

depression (CASELOAD): protocol for a feasibility trial. Pilot and
feasibility studies, 3(1), 3.
[14] Olalla, J., de Lomas, J. M. G., Márquez, E., González, F. J., Del Arco,
A., De La Torre, J., ... & Stachowski, J. P. (2019). Experience of
Using an App in HIV Patients Older Than 60 Years: Pilot Program.
JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 7(3), e9904.
[15] Lindgreen, P., Lomborg, K., & Clausen, L. (2018). Patient
experiences using a self-monitoring app in eating disorder treatment:
qualitative study. JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 6(6), e10253.
[16] Kirova, V., & Vo Thanh, T. (2019). Smartphone use during the
leisure theme park visit experience: The role of contextual factors.
Information & Management, 56(5), 742-753.
[17] Liu, Y., Huang, K., Bao, J., & Chen, K. (2019). Listen to the voices
from home: An analysis of Chinese tourists' sentiments regarding
Australian destinations. Tourism Management, 71, 337–347.
[18] Donald, A., Cizer, H., Finnegan, N., Collin-Histed, T., Hughes, D. A.,
& Davies, E. H. (2019). Measuring disease activity and patient
experience remotely using wearable technology and a mobile phone
app: outcomes from a pilot study in Gaucher disease. Orphanet
journal of rare diseases, 14(1), 212.
[19] Miah, S. J., Vu, H. Q., Gammack, J., & McGrath, M. (2017). A Big
Data Analytics Method for Tourist Behaviour Analysis. Information
& Management, 54(6), 771–785.
[20] Ozturk, A. B., Bilgihan, A., Nusair, K., & Okumus, F. (2016). What
keeps the mobile hotel booking users loyal? Investigating the roles of
self-efficacy, compatibility, perceived ease of use, and perceived
convenience. International Journal of Information Management, 36(6,
Part B), 1350-1359.
[21] Power, D. J. (2015). 'Big Data' Decision Making Use Cases. Revenue
B. Delibašić, J. E. Hernández, J. Papathanasiou, F. Dargam, P. Zaraté,
R. Ribeiro, S. Liu, & I. Linden , Decision Support Systems V — Big
Data Analytics for Decision Making (p 1-9). Springer International
Publishing.
[22] Shih, N.-J., Diao, P.-H., & Chen, Y. (2019). ARTS, an AR Tourism
System, for the Integration of 3D Scanning and Smartphone AR in
Cultural Heritage Tourism and Pedagogy. Sensors, 19(17), 3725.
[23] Su, X., Sperlì, G., Moscato, V., Picariello, A., Esposito, C., & Choi, C.
(2019). An Edge Intelligence Empowered Recommender System
Enabling Cultural Heritage Applications. IEEE Transactions on
Industrial Informatics, 15(7), 4266-4275.
[24] Wang, D., & Fesenmaier, D. R. (2013). Transforming the travel
experience: The use of smartphones for travel. In Information and
communication technologies in tourism 2013 (pp. 58-69). Springer,
Berlin, Heidelberg.
[25] Deuschl, D. (2006). Travel and Tourism Public Relations. London:
Routledge.
[26] Sun, Z., Wang, Y., Zhou, H., Jiao, J., & Overstreet, R. E. (2019).
Travel behaviours, user characteristics, and social-economic impacts
of shared transportation: a comprehensive review. International
Journal of Logistics Research and Applications, 1-28.
[27] Which day should be less crowded, Thursday or Friday? - Shanghai
Disneyland. https://www.tripadvisor.com/FAQ_Answers-g308272-
d10383031-t5401392-
Which_day_should_be_less_crowded_Thursday_or.html
[28] Yang, Y., & Leung, X. Y. (2018). A better last-minute hotel deal via
app? Cross-channel price disparities between HotelTonight and OTAs.
Tourism Management, 68, 198-209.
[29] Zahra, A., & Ryan, C. (2007). From chaos to cohesion — Complexity
in tourism structures: An analysis of New Zealand's regional tourism
organizations. Tourism Management, 28(3), 854-862.

387