VISITORS ’ EXPECTATIONS The Perceived Degree of Museumness

Abstract: Defining a physical or virtual space as a museum, seems to have clear implications on visitors' behaviour and particularly learning behaviour. Past research shows that it is essential to identify different museum types and consider their similarities, differences and special features in order to be able to make valid research hypotheses. However, visitors would not always define certain types of museums as museums.

Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2011

Mobile technologies such as multimedia guides (MMGs) are now an important part of the visitor experience in museums and other cultural spaces. We report the development of two scales to measuring visitors' museum experiences: the Museum Experience Scale (MES) and the Multimedia Guide Scale (MGS); these quantitative measures can helpfully complement qualitative information about visitor experience. A standard psychometric methodology was used in the development of these scales: from a large set of potentially relevant statements, 57 were chosen and 255 people rated a museum experience (102 of whom had used a multimedia guide). A Principal Components analysis yielded a four factor solution for the MES (Engagement, Knowledge/Learning, Meaningful Experience and Emotional Connection) and a three factor solution for the MMGS (General Usability, Learnability and Control, Quality of Interaction). Comparing respondents who used a MMG during their museum visit with those who did not, there was a significant difference on the Engagement component of the MES, with respondents who used a MMG being significantly more engaged. The other components of the MES did not show significant differences.

Over the past half-century, museums have evolved from being predominantly cultural repositories to playing an important social role as venues for educational leisure experiences. Accompanying this development has been an increased emphasis on optimising the visitor experience. The physical context of the museum has long been recognised as an important facet of the visitor experience (Falk & Dierking, 2000). However, the way that visitors perceive and respond to different types of exhibition environments on a holistic level has received relatively little research attention until recently. A key limitation in advancing research in this area has been a paucity of methods for quantifying and analysing visitor perceptions of the exhibition environment beyond simple measures of satisfaction. In order to address this gap, this thesis describes the development of a model for characterising how visitors perceive different exhibition environments – Perceived Atmosphere – and relates it to different facets of the visitor experience. As part of this study, a quantitative instrument known as the Perceived Atmosphere Instrument was piloted and refined. This allows the relationship between exhibition environment and visitor experience to be explored in greater depth. Development of Perceived Atmosphere was informed by environmental psychology, in particular environmental cognition, theories of spatial perception and the research field known as atmospherics (Kotler, 1974). Atmospherics is the study of the influence of retail environments and other service settings on customer attitudes and behaviour, and this study applied similar methods to a museum context. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected to explore and compare visitors’ perceptions of different exhibition environments at the South Australian Museum, a large natural and cultural history museum located in Adelaide, Australia. Qualitative data were collected through 12 pre-arranged accompanied visits to the museum, while quantitative data were collected from 602 visitors to the museum who agreed to participate in the study by completing a questionnaire that incorporated the Perceived Atmosphere Instrument. In addition, a small number of participants (n = 60) were unobtrusively tracked prior to completing the survey, allowing some preliminary analysis of the relationship between Perceived Atmosphere and visitor behaviour. Factor analysis of the 30 semantic differentials that comprise the Perceived Atmosphere Instrument produced a four factor solution interpreted as Vibrancy, Spatiality, Order and Theatricality. There were statistically significant differences between galleries on three of these four dimensions. These differences were interpretable in light of each gallery’s physical characteristics, but also indicate that a space’s perceived affordances are as important as its measurable physical properties. Of the Perceived Atmosphere dimensions, Vibrancy is the strongest predictor of affective, cognitive and behavioural engagement. Spatiality is a predictor of a sense of relaxation in the exhibition environment. There is a negative correlation between Order and a sense of cognitive overload. These results show that quantifying Perceived Atmosphere in an exhibition setting is technically feasible, theoretically coherent and capable of providing novel and useful insights into the environment-experience relationship. As well as advancing our theoretical understanding of the environment-experience relationship in the museum context, these findings make practical and methodological contributions to the field. The Perceived Atmosphere Instrument is a novel, easy-to-administer research tool that can be applied to a wide range of museum settings. The ability to characterise exhibition environments by their Perceived Atmosphere properties, in particular Vibrancy, Spatiality and Order, will be useful for exhibition planners, designers and evaluators.

Priorities for museums are changing. The mission of the new museology is to convert museums in places of enjoyment and learning, making its financial management very similar to a social enterprise competing with the amusement industry. As time goes on, museums need to establish and apply criteria necessary for their survival, paving the way for other public institutions to open up in their attempt to communicate and spread their heritage. We can already start talking about some commonly accepted conclusions about visitors' behavior, which are needed in order to plan for future exhibits that consider learning as a constructive process, collections as objects that carry meaning, and exhibits themselves as communication mediums that should transform the way of thinking of the spectator, serving the message itself. Internet seems to represent an effective medium to reach these objectives, showing capable of: a) Adapting to the interests and intellectual characteristics of a diverse audience. b) Rediscovering objects' meanings and take socio cultural recognition of its value through its interactive potential c) Make use of attractive and stimulating elements for the enjoyment of everybody. For this purpose is essential to question ourselves: Which criteria should respect a virtual museum in order to optimize the diffusion of its heritage? Which elements stimulate users to stay on a web page and have satisfactory virtual visits? What role does the application's usability play in all of this?

This extended paper summarises existing research on what museums can do to ensure people feel welcomed, at ease and in control of their visit. It has three objectives: 1. To focus on the museum user experience in a strategic, holistic way. 2. To take readers on the journey that is the museum user experience, through the many single point (or ‘touchpoint’) elements that together make up the visit, discussing how each of these can be improved. 3. To emphasise the importance of regular evaluation of the museum environment as a basis both for improvement and to help build the staff self-awareness culture essential for change. The paper is broken down into six sections. The Introduction defines the museum environment - the surroundings or conditions, physical, virtual and atmospheric, within which the museum visit takes place - and argues for its importance to the user experience-centred museum, particularly in reaching out to new audiences. The second section looks briefly at museum audiences, the starting point for anyone seeking to focus on the user experience. The third section defines the holistic museum user experience - the sum total of the memorable impacts of all aspects of a museum visit on users. It explores the range of experiences encountered in the museum and focuses on the need for museums to create the best environments in which to have those experiences. The fourth section forms the bulk of the paper, exploring the museum journey: ‘a timeline – a journey from a person’s first thought of visiting a museum, through the actual visit and then beyond, when the museum experience remains only in the memory’ (Falk and Dierking, 1992: xv). The section builds from that concept to create a framework, in the form of a wheel, for charting the museum journey, illustrated in figure 1. This framework then provides the structure for the section. The fifth section – evaluation – discusses five ways of evaluating your museum environment, emphasising the importance of creating a self-aware culture so that all members of staff and volunteers are constantly looking for ways to improve. The sixth and final section - planning the museum environment – makes clear that enhancing the museum environment is not something that can be done in a haphazard or piecemeal fashion. The museum user experience is a holistic one, so every element is of importance – and, as elements are changed, their impact is cumulative, so the changes need to be implemented in the right sequence to ensure consistency. Therefore, there needs to be an overall plan, even if not all of it can be actioned at once. It then puts forward some initial suggestions for getting started. The ambition is eventually to add a further section, providing links to relevant case studies.

The paper, Published in SCIRES Journal, Vol. 4 Issue 1 (http://caspur-ciberpublishing.it/index.php/scires-it/article/view/10918) presents an overview of the domain known as “Virtual Museums”, as it appears after the four year project V-MUST.NET. It aims at describing the shift we are assisting in the museum perception and management, including how virtual museums are and can be integrated in exhibits, highlighting positive and negative elements. Visitors and curators expectations and possible answers are described, also referred to the “Keys To Rome” international exhibit example. It finally proposes new possible researches directions.

Nordisk Museologi

Our museums are in crisis - assailed on two sides by changes that threaten the very core of the institutions mission. On the one hand, museums, the repositories of the real are becoming victims of their own success. The enormous number of visitors drawn to large museums by 'blockbuster' exhibitions and aggressive marketing now makes it almost impossible for those visitors to experience the museum collection in any but the most trivial sense. On the other hand, many smaller museums are seeing visitor numbers drop drastically, as the museum visit is considered to be 'old-fashioned: and many new educational opportunities formerly provided by the museum visit are now available, at home, on the computer. It is the position of this paper that to survive into the next century, our museums must augment those experiences which can only be had in situ, while aggressively exploiting new approaches to informal learning.

HCI 2018

Virtual reality offers museums the possibility of creating immersive and interactive user experiences which have not hitherto been possible. It is essential, however, to take into consideration the views, attitudes and experiences of the visitors to museums to achieve the maximum impact of these technologies. We present the results of a survey of visitors to a small museum, undertaken as part of the design work for a VR installation. The results show a good awareness of virtual reality among the museum's visitors and some experience with it, as well as a clear interest in it as a way of enhancing the museum experience.

Electronic Workshops in Computing, 2018

Virtual reality offers museums the possibility of creating immersive and interactive user experiences which have not hitherto been possible. It is essential, however, to take into consideration the views, attitudes and experiences of the visitors to museums to achieve the maximum impact of these technologies. We present the results of a survey of visitors to a small museum, undertaken as part of the design work for a VR installation. The results show a good awareness of virtual reality among the museum's visitors and some experience with it, as well as a clear interest in it as a way of enhancing the museum experience.

This paper argues that the concept of the 'museum learning environment' is a central support to learning in museums and must be extended beyond the physical to encompass every aspect of the user experience, from the potential visitor's initial contact with the museum to the resources that can be drawn on after the visit. The author, approaching the field from the point of view of an interpreter rather than a learning specialist, defines a series of practical principles that can be adapted by all museums. These prioritise mapping orientation and learning provision; the role of visitor services; empowering the user; minimizing visitor effort so the user can focus attention on what matters; taking an experience design approach to exhibition creation; encouraging reflection through social contact; supporting follow-up work; and the central role of seating! Personalising the museum visit Museums must recognise that they can no longer act as agents of mass communication but must instead seek to offer a personalised visit. We must acknowledge that: