In this paper, Glen Kaye of the National Park Service, Southwest Region, discusses advice on planning, researching, writing, designing and installing effective labels.
In this paper, Professor of Psychology at Suffolk University, Robert C. Webb, discusses the parallels between visitor studies and consumer psychology. Webb analyses the relevance of consumer literature as it relates to exhibit planning.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Amy Cota and Stephen Bitgood present abstracts of papers and articles on museum studies focused on memory.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Ann Cleghorn summarizes a 1993 "Museum Management and Curatorship" article written by Paulette M. McManus. The article cites findings from a study of visitor's memories as indicators of the impact of museum visits. The study analyzed visitors ages 8-50 years, who visited "Gallery 33, A Meeting Ground of Cultures in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery," an exhibition about human society and includes materials on beliefs, values, customs, and art from around the world.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Stephen Bitgood and Ann Cleghorn share findings from a study that attempted to assess recall for three different types of exhibit events: visual (exhibit objects), semantic (label content), and other sensory impressions (sounds, temperature, darkness, touch). The aim of the study was to compare recollections for these three types of knowledge across exhibit areas at the Anniston Museum of Natural History.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Stephen Bitgood reviews two studies that assessed knowledge gain in addition to other measures of exhibit effectiveness. These studies used tests of semantic knowledge as measures of exhibit effectiveness, which Bitgood argues are incomplete measures of knowledge and restrict researchers from assessing other types of memory (e.g. visual and episodic).
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Stephen Bitgood provides a brief overview of the psychology of memory as it relates to visitor studies professionals. Bitgood outlines stages of memory, types of memory, other memory concepts, knowledge and exhibit experiences, and the measurement of memory.
In this article, William A. Barnard of the University of Northern Colorado and Ross J. Loomis of Colorado State University discuss a series of research studies they conducted to address three basic questions concerning the evaluation of visual learning from exhibits: (1) Was it possible to determine how well people remember specific items that they had previously seen in exhibit collections? (2) What, if any, optimal number of exhibited items would serve to maximize visual learning? and (3) What is the potential relationship of the amount of time spent viewing objects and the retention of
In this article, evaluation consultant Harris H. Shettel outlines the value of remedial evaluation. Shettel cites evidence from a study of the "Man in His Environment" at the Field Museum in 1976.
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Harris H. ShettelVisitor Studies Association
In this article, Roger Miles, of the Natural History Museum in London, defends his 1993 proposal that deems the concept of remedial evaluation unnecessary. Miles presents counterarguments against proponents of remedial evaluation, Screven, Bitgood, and Shettel and argues for a classification based on the cyclical model of exhibition development.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Amy Cota and Stephen Bitgood address the following evaluation questions: (1) Would label reading decrease when the number of labels is increased? (2) Do groups who visit in families behave differently than groups composed of adults only? and (3) Do label readers view exhibit objects longer than nonreaders? The researchers share findings from a study that evaluated these questions in the Egyptian Mummy gallery at the Anniston Museum of Natural History.
In this article, Jacksonville State University's Stephen Bitgood responds to Roger Miles, a proponent of the Occam's Razor principle in determining the number of exhibit evaluation types, which argues for parsimony (fewest possible). Bitgood offers a rationale for Screven's four-type evaluation model based on multiple dimensions (when, why, how, what and who), accepts Miles's three-stage model of evaluation, and addresses Miles's criticisms of the use of remedial evaluation as one of the evaluation types. which Bitgood argues should not be cut from the list of evaluation types.