Emotional Valence from Facial Expression as an Experience Audit Tool: An Empirical Study in the Context of Opera Performance

This paper aims to explore the potential offered by emotion recognition systems to provide a feasible response to the growing need for audience understanding and development in the field of arts organizations. Through an empirical study, it was investigated whether the emotional valence measured on the audience through an emotion recognition system based on facial expression analysis can be used with an experience audit to: (1) support the understanding of the emotional responses of customers toward any clue that characterizes a staged performance; and (2) systematically investigate the customer’s overall experience in terms of their overall satisfaction. The study was carried out in the context of opera live shows in the open-air neoclassical theater Arena Sferisterio in Macerata, during 11 opera performances. A total of 132 spectators were involved. Both the emotional valence provided by the considered emotion recognition system and the quantitative data related to customers’ satisfaction, collected through a survey, were considered. Results suggest how collected data can be useful for the artistic director to estimate the audience’s overall level of satisfaction and make choices about the specific characteristics of the performance, and that emotional valence measured on the audience during the show can be useful to predict overall customer satisfaction, as measured using traditional self-report methods.