Museum Management and Curatorship

(1990), 9,149-168

Factors Influencing

Museum Visits

An Empirical Evaluation of Audience Selection

DAVID

R.

PRINCE

It is the currently received view that museums are burgeoning both in terms of the foundation of discrete institutions and the numbers of visitors that they attract. In the United Kingdom they are seen variously as academic institutions whose primary roles are the preservation, articulation and exhibition of artefacts evolved from both the natural and cultural heritages,* as symbols of local importance and pride,3 and as places of education and entertainment.4 Museums have existed in name for millennia5 and, in accordance with their role as interpreters of the past, are worldwide phenomena. In the United Kingdom, their growth since the mid-1970s has been remarkable6 and has been accompanied by a divergance into hitherto uncharted collecting areas. In the United Kingdom as a whole it has been estimated that over 100 million visits will have been made in 1989 to its 2000 or so museums;8 a visitor figure which represents an uplift of over 30 percent during the period since 1986.9 Seen as big business by the professionals who administer them, museums nevertheless receive, and are generally underwritten by (in the United Kindom at least), substantial public funding-to the tune of an estimated 2157.3 million in the fiscal year 1988/89. l1 They are variously supported by, amongst others, the local authority system, central government, universities, private groups and charitable trusts.* Directorial appointments to the national institutions attract national media attention, a government quango oversees trends,13 and their practitioners have evolved a network of organizations and self-interest groups to further their stated aims.14 They remain a considerable force within the arts and education lobbies and have more recently entered into the wider spheres of the expanding heritage and Green debates. Yet despite this, research concentrating on the perception of museums as social institutions by the public which they claim to serve is remarkably thin on the ground. Only a handful of museums, notably the Natural History Museum in London, have devised evaluative systems as a basis for structured project development15 (most of these associated with exhibitions), and scarcely any empirical work has been done on the ways in which they are perceived and valued as social institutions by their client audiences. Yet without such a perspective, it is difficult to imagine how museums can truly claim to serve a public that they make little attempt to understand, nor how they can be proactive in stimulating a wider audience base. In order to begin to correct this apparent imbalance, a county-wide survey of museum visitors and non-visitors was undertaken using Lincolnshire as the focus of a commissioned research project, the fundamental aim of which was to interpret visitor and non-visitor perception in ways that would aid the Countys museums service in more accurately marketing its institutions to a defined and articulated audience.16 This study is one of only a handful to look simultaneously at both visitors and non-visitors
0260-4779/90/01 0149-20 0 1990 Butterworth-Heinemann Ltd

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

and the ways in which they perceive museums as social institutions, and was the first ever to be undertaken on a county-wide basis in the United Kingdom.18 This article, which is a detailed examination of a number of the more significant aspects of that study, considers the nature of the audience selection process and the conditions which appear to be necessary before any decision to visit a museum is made and acted upon. Based on the returns of the 1988 Lincolnshire study, the findings do have a wider relevance, and are applicable to all institutions calling themselves museums and seeking to place their facilities as visitor attractions within what is widely accepted as a growing heritage market. The Museum Audience In considering simultaneous visitor and non-visitor surveys (audience appraisals), the operational definition of the museum audience is justifiably broadened from the actual visitor (the on-site audience) into both a consideration of the potential audience (that as yet untapped market that the museum could realistically exploit) and the target audience (that used in the practical day-to-day business of exhibition planning, advertising and so on). l9 Most visitor surveys, by definition, concentrate on the analysis of the on-site audience, and while they may be useful in characterizing type and in assessing visit value, likes, dislikes, and so on, they are not sufficently broadly based to assess image, and therefore to act as a real aid in the development of any future policies aimed at widening the audience base. For this, the inquiry needs also to consider non-visitors (as a legitimate part of the potential audience) and to include an appraisal of their perception of museums as both social institutions and visit destinations. This enables the potential audience to be defined more precisely and realistically, which in turn guides the definition of the target audience on a project-by-project basis. Whilst any museums potential audience may in theory be the entire population, in practice it is only a sample of it; the very nature of the institution and of the population contributing to the operation of the visit selection process.* Defining the boundaries of these audiences through the establishment of realistic market parameters is therefore the real challenge. Audience Selection in Theory In making a decision to visit, or not to visit, a museum, it is clear that at some point a choice between potential activities is made and acted upon by the individual concerned. This choice is made on the basis both of the information available and on how the person, broadly speaking, feels about the nature of the place as the focus of the proposed visit. Constantly at work in the activation of the choice process are two fundamental psychological elements that are individually more significant in their cumulative effect on behaviour than either the purely physical constraints of mobility and access or the financial consideration of discretionary-spend income: a cognitive (knowledge, comprehensional) element of what the place/visit is, and an effective component that assigns a value to the understanding of the place/visit. These combine to produce an attitude towards the place/visit that may (or may not) motivate action to make a visit The resulting depending upon the specifics of the attitude thus synthesized. selection-attitude is by definition dynamic since a change in either of the base components will necessarily cause its revision. When a positive (in the sense used here,

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pro-visit) selection-attitude is strong enough to stimulate action, a visit to the institution is (along the lines of this theory) occasioned. Information, as a core element in the attitude development process, is itself value-bound, since it is derived and assimilated from a myriad of disparate sources, each of which is necessarily given a value by those receiving and processing the information. If the source of the information is valued positively by the receiver, the information itself is more likely to be assigned positive characteristics. Conversely, information from providers perceived as having negative characteristics will be more likely to be viewed negatively. In its most simple form it is therefore possible to predict that word-of-mouth recommendation and promotion through friends, family, and so on, will be more effective in crystallizing a positive selection-attitude than cold, media-based advertising originated and released by less-valued third parties. This is often the case, particularly where the purchase of intangibles is concerned, and with activities that involve a commitment of time as well as other resources; as is true with a museum visit. By inference, the most important, most highly valued information-provider is the person whose attitude is being shaped. Any past experience with the object (event, place, institution) or with objects perceived as being conceptually similar (as the focus of the attitude) is therefore absolutely crucial to the development of the perceptual stance that leads to the choice to visit being made. Exploring these experiences and relationships is therefore a key element in audience appraisal. Given that an understanding of the nature and characteristics of the object is necessary to the development of an attitude, it is nevertheless possible for the same social object to be viewed in the same way by people but valued completely differently. A museum may be perceived as an educational institution by all, but, because it is regarded in this way, valued positively by only a few. Indeed, the very fact that it is perceived as being educational may be a strong deterrent to some, depending on how education, and the role that museums are seen to play within and as part of the educational system, is valued. Thus any exploration of attitudes towards social objects and the motivators that stimulate pro-visit selection-attitudes must probe deeper than the level of simple likes and dislikes to how these preferences are both developed and maintained, and how they are transferred from one social object to another. This is crucial when the outcome of the selection process takes place as the result of relatively free choice in the allocation and use of non-obligated time (as is usually the case with a museum visit), since it is clear that those who choose not to visit a museum do so because thay have chosen positively to spend their time doing something they value and enjoy more highly. The attraction of visitors to museums is not simply a problem of providing new institutional images, it is also one of, in a very real sense, destabilizing the positive images held about other objects and activities with which they are seen to compete. The role of past experience in shaping and directing new perceptions and new behaviours rooted in these perceptions has been well rehearsed in psychological theory2i and has been explored recently in a museum context.22 One of the main outcomes as far as the current discussion is concerned is that the perceptual process, as driven by past experience, will tend towards consistency in behaviour, particularly where the exercise of choice exists in the determination of that behaviour. This indicates that leisure destinations and recreational activities are chosen on the basis that the chooser feels psychologically comfortable with the choice. Pursuing any activity based on this choice (if it proves ultimately to be satisfactory) subsequently reinforces the choosers direct experience, thereby occasioning a trend towards a future, maintained behavioural consistency and a stabilized outcome of the selection process.

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

The trend towards maintaining consistency in the choice and activation of visit behaviour is reinforced by the notion that the demonstration of such consistency does not provoke a dissonant reaction to activities either undertaken or planned, and therefore sits comfortably within the visitors whole range of self-perceptions. Maintaining cognitive consonance is an important psychological motivator in its own right, which in turn helps to fuel the trend towards maintaining perceptual and behavioural consistency. Important differences in underlying perceptual outcomes can therefore be hypothesized to exist, between museum visitors and non-visitors, that can be broadened into other destinations perceived, by them, as being conceptually similar: historic houses and stately homes may be examples. 23 Thus, heritage (the term being used loosely here) visitors and non-visitors should, from this perspective, exhibit sustained patterns of behaviour in their choice of use of non-obligated time that enables their future museum visiting patterns to be predicted with an acceptable degree of accuracy. It is just these patterns that this paper seeks to explore. As a buttress to the psychological well-being associated with undertaking an activity exhibiting positive (to the chooser) characteristics, other factors are brought into play whilst making the choice to visit and in referencing the activity undertaken on the basis of that choice. The marketing concept of people like us, which in a museum setting would indicate visitor penetration from certain social and life-orientation groups at the relative expense of others, is important here, as is the concept that leisure time should (for certain groups) be used constructively as part of a larger socio-political end. For some, a visit to a museum at certain times is such a constructive use. It is also something some people like to be seen doing and like others to know that they do. The choice of holiday destinations, let alone the activities undertaken, indicates that this is the case when (relatively) major decisions are taken as to the allocation of non-obligated time. It should be reiterated that it is the application of choice, and not the availability of free time as such, that is the key to understanding patterns of museum visiting. This has been demonstrated on the large scale by using national statistics related to unemployment (enforced free time) and museum visiting, 24 and is, in essence, the unrealized outcome of most of the visitor surveys undertaken over the last twenty years or so at museums, whether nationa1,25 local authority,26 university* or independent.28 Against this background it is also clear that certain structural (non-psychological) influences mediate in the specifics of the visit choice to some degree. Physical location in places reasonably close to suitable museums, and the availability of a car, are obvious examples. These, however, relate more to a specific outlet rather than to the choice to visit a museum per se. More importantly, the ways in which museums are perceived by their potential audiences are crucial factors that set the background against which the current visit (or non-visit) is referenced. The image of museums is crucial, not only to a deeper understanding of visit/non-visit behaviour, 29 but also as a framework around which current visit perceptions and behavioural outcomes can be structured and interpreted. As social institutions, museums perform a variety of functions that are defined and valued in different ways depending upon the perspective of the viewer. The professional, whose primary responsibility is the maintenance of the integrity of the collections, views their use differently from the visitor to an exhibition. Moreover, different visitors will view the same exhibition and the institution within which it is held differently depending upon their background, motivation and specific visit intention.

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Audience Selection in Practice The overwhelming weight of evidence currently available on museum visits suggests unequivocally that visitors are drawn from an unrepresentative sample of the British population with, broadly speaking, the middle class (however defined) being the dominant visiting group. This is not to say that all museum visitors are drawn from this group, or that other groups are not represented, but more that the weight of statistical evidence from a variety of sources is such as to remove the possibility of chance factors contributing significantly to the visiting profiles obtained by museum surveys at whatever type of institution is under consideration. Clearly, class factors alone (as defined narrowly on the basis of occupational type) are not entirely adequate as explanatory tools in determining museum visiting patterns, since all social groups are represented to some degree. Attitudes and life-values are more useful analytical devices for understanding the problem, even though these are themselves mediated by class factors as reflected in, for example, peer group and culture self-recognition and allegiance. Nevertheless, it is first necessary to consider visits on a grouped basis in order to make sense of much of the data currently available and to place those obtained by the Lincolnshire study into the wider context of museum visiting. The Lincolnshire evaluation produced the immediate conclusion that class factors were indeed at work in the visit selection process, with clear and unequivocal differences being recorded for each social group profile on a visitor/non-visitor basis (Table 1).
Table 1. Museum Visiting and Social Group Group SMC ING
woe

Visitor (%o) (%o)

(%o) N (%)

Non-visitor
10 46 43 100 498 23

(%e) 28
46 26 2147 100

33 45
21 100 1649 77

(%o) observed (recorded) percentages. (%e) statistically expected percentages produced visitors/non-visitors by social group (chi-square = 0.0000). Odds ratios = SMC-WOC 6.8 :l SMC-ING 3.4:1 ING-WOC 2.0:1

by chi-square for = 134.539, d.f. = 2, P

For the purpose of the study, a museum visitor was defined as a respondent who stated that he or she had visited any museum or art gallery in the twelve-month period prior to interview. Producing an acceptable and useful definition of class for such a study is more problematical. In considering the notion of class (as a much-used method of analytical group formulation) in ways that allow for the statistical interpretation of its effect on museum attendance in Lincolnshire and elsewhere, quantitative indices have to be assigned to the social profile data derived by the field survey. Whilst this lessens the subtlety of the concept of class as an analytical device, it is nonetheless essential if acceptable and meaningful interpretations are to be made of the data in ways that allow comparison with other surveys. It is important also as a basis from which to begin to

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

model potential visitors and to relate these recognizable and identifiable subgroups to other aspects of visit/non-visit behaviour. Whilst it is common practice in many aspects of social research to produce a class definition based solely on occupational type, in a museum context it is more beneficial to include educational experience as a qualifying element in the development of operational class profiles. Not to so do would, for example, effectively exclude all those not currently part of the active labour market from inclusion in the analyses, and would correspondingly limit the overall usability and acceptability of the data obtained. Similarly, the adoption of the widely used market research grades of A, B, Cl, and so on, are, by their concentration on income and life style as analytical profile determinants, too consumer-behaviour orientated to be of real worth to the evaluation of museum audience profiles. Whilst it may be true that certain standards of living have to be present before any form of cost-involved leisure activity is undertaken, the availability of such discretionary-spend income does not (within reason) determine the choice of the activity itself. A system that categorized individuals into one of three broad social groups based on the interplay of educational experience and current (or last) employment is satisfactory for current purposes, and was adopted for the Lincolnshire study. Through this approach three social groups (defined as the salaried middle class, the intermediate group and the working class) were produced and characterized as follows.3o The Salaried Middle Class (SMC). This group consists of professionals, semiprofessionals, managers and other white-collar workers in supervisory or autonomous jobs with relatively high salaries and security. Members have typically attended a selective school (defined as one to which access is/was restricted on the basis of academic qualifications or the payment of fees, or both) that they left after the minimum school-leaving age then pertaining, and have attended post-school, full-time education at a university or other institute of higher education. The Inter-mediate Group (ING). This group consists typically of routine non-manual workers (secretaries, clerks, and so on), together with foremen and technicians. They may exercise a degree of authority over other workers but are themselves subject to authority at work from line and other managers. Pay scales, and therefore disposable incomes, reflect this relative position. The group is not homogeneous in terms of educational background, with a mix of both selective and non-selective schools recorded and higher education attendance being recorded.
The Working Class (WOC). This group consists of the rank and file manual employees in, primarily, the production, construction and processing industries. Whilst their take-home pay may be relatively high, job security is low and their work is subordinated to that of the other groups. No distinction has been made between semi- and unskilled jobs. Typically, members of this group have attended non-selective schools, have left at the minimum school-leaving age and have not attended full-time, post-school education.

It should be noted in passing that no political inferences should be drawn from these group categories. They are simply analytical descriptions enabling individuals of like backgrounds (as defined) to be grouped in ways that afford an interpretive analytical vehicle for the data.

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Visitors and Non-visitors

Comparing visitors and non-visitors in terms of these social-class descriptors reveals highly significant differences between the social groups along the lines hypothesized as earlier; that is, that the salaried middle class (SMC) as a group is over-represented visitors to an extent that far outweighs its representation within society as a whole and within the locality of each museum surveyed. Indeed, the SMC is the only group to be over-represented as museum visitors. As a corollary to this, the working class (WOC) is over-represented within the non-visitor category. Whilst the data presented in Table 1 (as revealed by the chi-square statistic) are statistically highly significant, a clearer interpretation of their implications is provided by a consideration of the Odds Ratio, which is a measure of relative, as opposed to absolute, representation. This ratio is calculated as a relative measure between, in this case, the visitor and non-vistor groups and two social classes simultaneously. For example, the odds ratio for the SMC and the WOC is computed as, from Table 1, (33/21)/(10/43) = 6.8:1, indicating that a member of the SMC has seven times more chance of being interviewed at a museum (that is, has seven times more chance of actually being at the museum) than a member of the WOC: a highly significant statistic. The odds ratios for the three groups form a continuum in accordance with the direction of the visit/non-visit hypothesis being explored. In absolute terms, however, the largest number of visits (nearly half the total) is made by the intermediate group. This is interpreted as a function of their presence within society as a whole rather than specifically as museum visitors; a conclusion supported by the relevant odds ratios recorded at the foot of Table 1, and confirmed by the findings presented in Table 3. As an extension of this simple visitor/non-visitor model, all respondents (irrespective of whether they were interviewed at one of the museums or on the street) were asked to state whether they considered themselves to be regular, occasional or infrequent museum visitors; the respondents being free to provide their own definitions of the descriptive terms used. This line of questioning provides an important extension to the results displayed in Table 1 by accommodating the respondents self-perception of museum visiting, bearing in mind the role that such self-perception plays in underpinning the attitudes which motivate subsequent pro-visit/non-visit choice and behaviour. The results are shown in Table 2, from which it is clear that the same general pattern of group representation (as shown by the odds ratios and the differences between the observed and expected percentages within each cell) is again readily apparent; in this case an odds ratio of 5.1 :l between the SMC and the WOC across the regular/infrequent spreads is an example. Thus, the SMC is significantly over-represented as self-defined regular museum visitors and significantly under-represented as self-defined infrequent visitors, with the reverse being the case for the WOC. The intermediate group is just that: its observed-against-expected representations in each cell being remarkably consistent and showing marginal statistical differences between the regular and occasional and the occasional and infrequent visit self-definitions. Thus, not only are members of the SMC as, primarily, actually over-represented as visitors to museums, their self-perception regular museum visitors is likely to reinforce the recorded at-museum patterns. The pattern noted in Table 1 holds good for all three groups. Table 3 reinforces these trends by comparing specifically the at-museum and on-street data profiles in relation to social group for all seven museums surveyed. The important inference here is that although there are observable differences between the at-museum

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Factors Injluencing Museum Visits Table 2. Social Group and Frequency Occasional Visitor 29 47 25 100 960 44 of Museum Visiting Infrequent Visitor 16 48 36 100 675 31 (%e)

Class

Regular Visitor (%o) (%o) (%o) Counts (%) 41 41 18 100 532 25

SMC ING woe

28 46 26 2167 100

(%o) observed (recorded) percentages (%e) statisticaIly expected percentages 116.564, d.f. = 4, P = 0.0000). Odds ratios = SMC-WOC SMC-ING (reg./inf.) ING-WOC 5.1 :l 3.0:1 1.8:1

produced

by chi-square

for visitor type by social group (chi-square

Table 3. Comparison
Museum Location

of At-Museum

and On-Street SMC (%) am/as 40/28 37/21 36/27 36/16 30/27

Samples (all cell values are percentages) ING (%) am/as 46/49 41/52 46/48 45/45 50/48 woe (%) am/as 14/23 22/27 18/25 20/39 20/25

Stamford Grantham Usher AG Lincoln Gainsborough Old Hall Lines Life, Lincoln City and County, Lincoln

Church Farm Skegness

am = at-museum

26/27 16/07

48/46 47/37

26/27 37156

(N = 1219); OS = on-street

(N = 865).

and on-street samples at an absolute level (the percentage of SMC visitors, for example, ranges from 40 percent at Stamford to 16 percent at Skegness) their representations are consistent within each of the locations (for example, the SMC is over-represented by a factor of approximately two at both Stamford and Skegness). These findings accord well with the patterns noted earlier, thereby confirming visit self-selection-in of the SMC and visit self-selection-out of the WOC irrespective of their absolute representation at each of the locations surveyed. This highly important observation could have been realized only through undertaking simultaneous visitor and non-visitor surveys at the same location, and is fundamental to the interpretation of museum visiting patterns, irrespective of the specifics of the museums concerned.

Behavioural

Consistency

In developing the visitor/non-visitor model, it is important to consider other exhibited leisure behaviours in order to place the museum visit (or non-visit) in a more complete context and to begin to accommodate factors in audience selection other than those that can be demonstrated and sustained through the analysis and interpretation of class

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groups, however defined. Since the choice to visit a museum is made in relation to the other visit destinations that could be chosen in preference, a consideration of other, selected institutions visited by museum visitors and non-visitors is an important qualifying element in the audience selection (and therefore appraisal) process. An understanding of alternative visit destinations also serves to build up a picture of the leisure sites visited by museum visitors and, in this way, besides indicating the museums potential competitors in market-attractive terms, also provides additional, highly useful information on the visitors and non-visitors themselves, particularly in relation to the all-important marketing concept of behavioural consistency in visitor attraction and the perception and grouping of cultural institutions within wider recreational frameworks. The theory of behavioural consistency in visitor attraction31 hypothesizes that a visitor, having opted into visiting museums, should maintain this consistency by visiting other similarly perceived (in this case, heritage-related) sites. Simultaneously, it predicts that if people opt out of visiting museums they should also opt out of visiting similarly perceived sites, since they will also be maintaining behavioural consistency in this regard. The Lincolnshire study presented the opportunity of exploring the validity of this theory by assessing the visiting patterns of both museum visitors and non-visitors to a selection of alternative visit destinations. Museum visitors were defined as those who responded that they had visited any museum or art gallery in the twelve-month period prior to interview. Respondents were asked to state which of any of eight quoted visit destinations they had visited in that same twelve-month period. Table 4 presents the cross-tabulated findings.
Table 4. Museum Visitors and Non-Visitors: Alternative Visit Destinations
(all cell values are percentages) Place Nat Res nv 47 29 53 71 Hist Hs nv 61 39 31 61 Fort Bg
V

zoo
V

nv

nv 75 85

MV NV Place

72 34

27 66

25 15

Co Park
V

Na Park
V

nv

nv

Library nv 20 43

Cinema nv 52 60

MV NV N = 2244.
V:

49 28

51 72

44 23

57 78

80 58

48 40

visitor Xl: non-visitor

Museum Museum visitor non-visitor

Nat Res: Nature Reserve Hist Hs: Historic House

Fort Bg: Co Park: Na Park: Fortified Country National Building Park Park

MV: NV:

These results are also interpreted by way of a scatter-plot (Figure 1) which reveals more readily the direction and strength of audience convergence (similarity) and divergence (dissimilarity) between both museum visitors and non-visitors simultaneously. The plot is based on the intial assumption that, if no other factors were at work, the chance of a museum visitor or a non-visitor visiting another stated destination would be equal at 0.5; taking the usual statistical representation of certainty (that all museum

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

np = national park nr = nature reserve cp = country park ci = cinema fb = castle or fortified building hh = historic house or stately home Ii = library

Figure

1. Scatter plot of audience

convergence

visitors and non-visitors will be visitors to the other destination) as being 1 and impossibility (that no museum visitors and non-visitors will be visitors to the other destination) as being 0. Thus, based on the cross-tabulations given in Table 4, the museum visitor/historic house visitor index of convergence is calculated as (0.69/0.5 = 1.38) and the museum non-visitor/historic house non-visitor index as (0.61/0.5 = 1.22). It is therefore possible to place the combined index (X = 1.38, y = 1.22) on the plot shown. Similar calculations for all eight visit destinations are displayed in Figure 1. The value of this combined index is four-fold. Firstly, it displays clearly the direction and strength of museum visitors and non-visitors convergence and divergence in relation to specified alternative destinations. Second, since it takes into account the visiting patterns of both visitors and non-visitors, it simultaneously extends and qualifies the more usual approach of taking such patterns in isolation. Third, the results are therefore more realistic in their portrayal of the degree of audience convergence, which in turn helps to clarify the audience selection outcomes and the process by which it is realized. Fourth, since any visit destination could be taken as the independent variable, the method presents a wealth of analytical and interpretive possibilities. As a guide to the interpretation of Figure 1, if all museum visitors and non-visitors were also visitors to a stated destination, then the resulting plot would lie at the extreme corner of the bottom right-hand quadrant, indicating total audience convergence as

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visitors to the stated destination. Similarly, if all museum visitors and museum non-visitors were also non-visitors to another destination, then the plot would lie at the extreme corner of the top left-hand quadrant, indicating total audience convergence as non-visitors to the stated destination. Museum visitor/non-visitor divergent zones (visitors as visitors, non-visitors as non-visitors) therefore emerge as being the top right (for the former) and bottom left (for the latter) quadrants. Based on this index, Figure 1 clearly demonstrates that a high degree of audience commonality exists between museum visitors and visitors to castles, fortified buildings and historic houses; indeed these form the core cluster of museum-related visit destinations. A second cluster of similar visit destinations (national and country parks and nature reserves) is also clearly revealed. Allowing for the fact that the visit-availability of these places in terms of their occurrence and spatial distribution has obviously had a bearing on the results obtained, the overall audience relationships between museums and other physical buildings and structures housing material artefacts and antiquities cannot be over-emphasized. These results accord with the direction of the theory being developed in that they reveal a clear opting-in of visits to destinations perceived as offering similar conceptual benefits to museum visitors and an opting-out by museum non-visitors. Behavioural consistency and perceptual consonance in both groups is therefore maintained. This relationship is reinforced when the social profiles of the respondents are included in the model (Figure 2). In every case save that of zoos (which was revealed as an isolate by Figure 1) the visiting profiles form a continuum from the SMC to the WOC, and range in visit penetration from an SMC rate of 85 percent (libraries) to 25 percent (national parks). The tendency for the salaried middle class not only to be museum

y;:

25%-

s;; ---------_\
I Ii I fb

01

I
hh

I r Visit

I ci destination

I cP

I P

I zo

Ii = library fb = castle or fortified hh = historic house or nr = nature reserve ci = cinema cp = country park np = national park zo = zoo

building stately home

Figure 2. Social group by alternative visit destinations

160

Factors Influencing

Museum

Visits

visitors but also to be visitors of perceptually related institutions is therefore supported fully by these results. Thus, visits to museums are heavily influenced by the socio-demographic background of potential visitors, leading to the choice to visit being made by only a sample of all those potentially available to choose to visit. It is also clear that differences in socio-demographic background are manifested in the frequency of museum visiting and in the other types of leisure/recreational destinations chosen. The theory of behavioural consistency has been applied to establish a broad model of visitors and non-visitors to museums; the applicability of which has been demonstrated with reference to other visit destinations and the convergence of audience types. However, since all social groups are represented to some degree at museums, socio-demographic considerations alone cannot account entirely satisfactorily for differences between visitors and non-visitors. A more individualized approach needs to be adopted to qualify the overall visit/non-visit patterns emerging from the social and behavioural indices thus far considered. Comparable Images Such an approach can be achieved by examining the expressed images held by visitors and non-visitors towards museums as elicited by questions covering how they are perceived and valued as social institutions and how they could be improved to make them more attractive visit destinations. The central line of argument here is that, given the respondents socio-demographic background, and its associated behavioural ramifications in museum-visting terms, the development of pro-museum attitudes can, and does, take place within all social groups that account for the representation of each within the museum-visiting population, even though, as we have seen, this representation is biased in favour of certain groups. As a guide to understanding the overall institutional image assigned to museums, all respondents were asked to state which one of six given alternative visit destinations cathedrals/ (libraries, historic houses/stately homes, zoos, commercial exhibitions, churches, fortified buildings/castles), reminded them most of a museum. All but two (a commercial exhibition and a cathedral or church) have been used earlier as visit-targets for comparative audience purposes and all were chosen to represent a conceptual mix of styles, periods and symbolic meanings. The results are presented in Figure 3. Whilst it is accepted that there is a degree of limitation built into the results by requesting the respondents to choose one of six visit destinations as opposed to choosing freely (those who did not choose, 18 percent of the total sample, were excluded from the analysis), the results are unequivocal in their implications. First, the overwhelming majority (two-thirds) consider the closest image to a museum to be that of an historic house or stately home. This applies irrespective of whether or not the respondent was a museum visitor. Such institutions have associated constructs of longevity and solidity coupled with the preservation of objects of perceived value. This finding accords fully with the audience patterns noted in Figure 1 and reinforces the concept that whilst the image of the museum and associated institutions is common to most, the value placed upon this image differs, of which more later. Second, castles and fortified structures are primarily associated with museums by about one in five of the sample. Again, the concepts of longevity and solidity apply here, coupled, perhaps, with a degree of protectionism. Third, one in ten respondents considered the closest match to be a cathedral or church, perhaps evoking images associated with protection (sanctuary), permanence and paternalism. They are also, in the

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60% I50%

\ \ \ \ \ \ \

-- -- Non-visitors -Museum visitors

10% -

hh

fb

cc Visit

Ii destination

ce

ZO

hh = historic house or stately home fb = castle or fortified building cc = cathedral or church Ii = library ce = commercial exhibition zo = zoo

Figure 3. Visitors and non-visitors: comparable images

main,

highly decorative, formal structures containing works of fine and decorative art. Fourth, libraries were associated with museums by only 5 percent of the total sample. This finding was alluded to in Figure 1 (where libraries were revealed as being an isolate) and can be interpreted along functional lines, in that the two institutions are clearly museums are dissimilar in operation. Whilst both are depositories of information, concerned fundamentally with the presentation and interpretation of real objects, direct public access to which is usually barred. Conversely, libraries are concerned with providing replicated source material direct to the public and devoid of additional interpretation. The public clearly differentiates between these roles and therefore between them as institutions and as visit destinations. Fifth, museums (as exhibition spaces) are not associated by the public in any way with commercial operations. Their linking with commercial exhibitions is marginal in the extreme. Sixth, notwithstanding the fact that a zoo is, according to the International Council of Museums definition,32 a museum, the public manifestly does not share this view; less than 1 percent of the sample classed zoos as the closest institutional match; a finding reiterative of that recorded in Figure 1. Therefore, it appears from this analysis that the concepts of longevity, solidity, protection and permanence associated with historic houses, castles, fortified structures and, to some extent, religious building have an echo in museums. Museums are an image-focus for all these perceptions in the publics cognition, which enables elements of them to be assigned to other institutions which then become legitimate, alternative visit destinations. Earlier evidence has shown that visitors to museums are also likely to be visitors to historic houses, stately homes, castles and fortified buildings, as they opted into (loosely) the heritage-visiting group. It has also demonstrated that non-visitors to museums are likely to be non-visitors to these same heritage sites. The current analysis has shown that both groups share a common, underlying perspective towards these

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

institutions even though their behaviour towards, and engagement with, them clearly differs. Consistency is, however, maintained by both groups. This is an important observation since it has been widely assumed that museums, in order to attract additional visitors, need to make their operations more clearly understood by the public; this understanding would, it was assumed, increase the chance of a visit being made. That this is not the case has been clearly demonstrated, with the result that new initiatives for the presentation of institutional images will need to be considered. The Perception of Museums

With these over-arching institutional images in mind, the Lincolnshire survey inquired specifically about the values and constructs associated with museums as visit destinations. This is a key area which hones the broad perceptions already considered, and which goes a long way towards explaining differences in visit and non-visit choice. Questioning in this area was effected through the application of a three-point semantic differential scale (agree-unsure-disagree) in which the interviewee was asked to respond to a given series of value-words and value-statements directed at museums, together with a multiple-statement (ten-choice) question in which the respondent was free to choose any or all of the suggestions stated to make, in the respondents own view, museums more attractive as visit-destinations. These statements are given in full in the Notes,33 and were designed to cover not only the publicly accessible aspects of museum operation, but also those dealing with their fundamental aims and objectives as institutions. Although the reponses to a selection of these value-statements are discussed in turn below, a more informative initial approach is to construct an idealized, pro-museum stance and then to explore degrees of convergence with, and divergence from, this view. From the survey questions, such a singularly positive range of views is expressed by respondents considering museums as being educational, entertaining and interesting, doing a valuable job in protecting our heritage and in not being a waste of tax-payers money. Similarly, a pro-museum stance would be that they are not boring, only for children or only for intellectuals, and that they are not perceived as being static or out of touch with today. By combining the responses to all ten value-statements in this way, 43 percent of all those interviewed were revealed as holding highly positive (pro-museum) perceptions about the nature and operational environment of museums. This is a relatively high figure which indicates a considerable degree of public support for the maintenance and development of such institutions, quite apart from the fact that a recent global survey indicated that public expenditure on the arts was deemed to be a low priority by the British public.34 Within this overall view, however, significant differences were found to exist in the general direction of the visit/non-visit hypothesis being explored. First, whereas over half of the SMC group expressed this consolidated view, less than 40 percent of the ING and the WOC did so. Second, and not surprisingly, self-defined museum non-visitors were only one-third as likely to record such positive images as visitors. Third, the more committed a museum visitor is (on the basis of self-defined frequency of museum visitation) the more likely is it that such a consolidated, positive image is held. For example, only one-third of infrequent visitors expressed such a view. Fourth, the age of the respondent was found to have a significant relationship to the maintenance of such positive images on the basis that the older the respondent, the more likely it was that such views would be held. Whereas only one-third of those aged under

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24 years held such a view, half of those over 35 did so. This last observation reinforces the visiting patterns recorded at all seven museums on-site and by the respondents stated behaviour with regard to alternative visit destinations. Given that these images represent the overall view, a consideration of the response patterns noted for a selection of the individual value statements is revealing. For example, only a marginal 5 percent of respondents doubted that museums do a valuable job in age, socioprotecting our heritage, this applying irrespective of the respondents demographic background or frequency of museum visiting. It is a remarkably consistent attitude, indicating that this image of museum operation is widely held, understood and accepted. Because of the perceived value of this function, almost none of the respondents considered tax expenditure on museums to be a waste. The view that museums are educational institutions is supported almost to the point of totality by the survey; all variables revealing across-the-board similarity at an average of 98 percent. The two combined, that museums are educational institutions concerned with the preservation and protection of heritage, is sufficiently close to their accepted professional definition to support the view that their role and aspirations are understood and supported by both professionals and the public alike, quite apart from that publics desire to visit them. Interestingly, museums were also revealed as being pro-nationalistic institutions, instilling a sense of pride in the nations past. As depositories and interpreters of the physical remnants of the past, this result may not be surprising, although it does perhaps indicate that museums are associated more with the human past (through history, archaeology, and so on) rather than with a naturalistic past (through, for example, the exhibition of natural history). The earlier findings related to the clusters of visiting patterns associated with national parks, country parks and nature reserves may go some way towards clarifying this observation. Stemming from their perception as being educational institutions, museums are viewed as being good places to take children and young people, but not exclusively so; only a marginal 2 percent considered them to be places solely for the benefit of this group. Even though this educational image is strong and widely held, museums are not seen generally as being places primarily for the benefit of scholars or intellectuals. However, there are significant differences between visitors and non-visitors, between the social class and between regular and infrequent visitors in this regard; over twice as many non-visitors (14 percent) as visitors (6 percent), the WOC (16 percent) as the SMC (4 percent) and infrequent (12 percent) as opposed to regular visitors (4 percent) stated that museums are really the preserve of scholars and other highly educated people. These findings lend weight to the view that this strong educational image is a negative attribute for some, providing a disincentive to visit. The concepts of institutional stability and permanence raised earlier have an echo in these results. Nearly one in five respondents agreed with the statement that a museum never changes; when your have seen it once, youve seen it enough. However, there are sufficiently strong statistically significant differences between visitors (13 percent) and non-visitors (34 percent) and between regular (7 percent) and infrequent (30 percent) museum visitors, to imply that the less contact a person has with a museum the more likely it is that they will hold the view that they never change. This is a self-reinforcing selection attitude in behavioural terms, providing an additional degree of justification for non-visiting. In terms of enjoyment, very few (a marginal 3 percent) hold the impression that museums are boring, the majority (88 percent) considering them to be entertaining. As expected, the less frequently visits are deemed to be made, the less strongly is this view

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

held. Of note is that more respondents found them to be interesting than entertaining, perhaps as a component of the main educational perception described earlier. More respondents considered museums to be old-fashioned (14 percent) than the stronger old fusty places out of touch with today (6 percent). However, in both cases, non- and infrequent visitors are more likely to express these sentiments, statistically significant differences being revealed by the cross-tabulations. This result accords well with the never-changing attribute noted earlier. Two value statements caused a more even agree/disagree split than any of the others. First, museums were stated to be places you get more out of . . . when you are on holiday by over half (56 percent) of the total sample with statistically significant differences in favour of non- and infrequent visitors, the WOC and the older (45 plus) age-groups. This finding has had an influence on the visiting/non-visiting patterns recorded for the at-museum and on-street in Table 3, particularly for the seaside holiday destination of Skegness where 60 percent of all non-residents interviewed stated that they were on holiday at the time of interview. Second, the need for greater participation by the public in museums is clearly supported by this study; an average 62 percent agreeing with the statement that museums would be a lot better if there were more things for people to actually do. This view is held more strongly by younger people (73 percent of the under 34s); the other variables revealing only marginal (non-significant) differences. The statement that to really appreciate a museum, you have to know something about it before you go in was supported by on average one in three of the sample, with statistically significant differences in a non-visit-making direction being recorded for non- and infrequent visitors, the WOC and the older (55 plus) age-groups. This supports the trend found in the statement museums are for intellectuals only (that is, those with, in the respondents view, such a prior knowledge base) and has an echo in the people like us concept noted earlier. As well as eliciting expressed attitudes by requesting respondents to comment on a series of value-words and statements, the survey also took the opportunity of exploring them through an examination of a series of suggested improvements that could, theoretically, be made to museums in order to make them more attractive visit destinations. By requesting positive attributes, this line of questioning provides a balance to some of the more negative sentiments expressed by the value-statements and was also used as an analysis check on the internal consistency of the attitudes expressed. The question asked was: Can you suggest any changes or improvements to museums that would make it more likely for you to visit them ? Ten options were presented from which each respondent was free to choose any or all of them. They were intended to cover both the public face and the internal presentation and interpretation of museum operations. The stated options are as shown in Note 33 and the results displayed in Table 5. In terms of the average response from the entire sample, not one of the suggested improvements was supported by more than half of the respondents; indeed all but one were approved of by less that one-third. Within this overall view, however, significant differences are discernible on some of the statements between, for example, visitors and non-visitors and stated frequency of museum visitation. Of those who stated that their chance of visiting a museum would be improved if it opened for longer hours, especially in the evening, self-defined regular museum visitors were represented twice as often as infrequent visitors. On this basis, the museum audience profiles recorded earlier would simply be repeated if opening hours were lengthened. Widening the attendance profile of a museum is therefore clearly not to be achieved by increasing its availability.

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Table 5. Suggestions
percentages) Stated Improvement

for Improvements

to Increase the Likelihood

of a Museum Visit (all cell values are

All
19 31 27 12 21 16 26 46 27 22

V
21 33 29 12 22 17 28 48 30 24

NV
13 24 21 10 14 10 20 37 17 16

Reg
28 36 31 16 23 19 31 54 38 27

Inf
19 33 27 12 23 17 29 48 29 22

occ
13 25 23 10 15 11 19 38 17 17

Open longer hours Provide more advertising Provide better catering Make shops more attractive Make exhibitions more inviting Show more about the present Have more local exhibitions Provide workshops More special/temp. exhibitions Show more films/videos
N = 2229. V: NV: Museum Visitor Non-Visitor

Reg: Regular Museum Visitor Inf: Infrequent Museum Visitor Occ: Occasional Museum Visitor

The study does not provide much encouragement for museums to improve or enhance their retailing facilities or potential. Only 27 percent of the total sample considered that by providing better cafes and restaurants, and a mere 12 percent that by making the shops more attractive with a better range of goods to buy would their chances of making a visit be increased. The museums primary non-retailing image noted earlier is clearly reinforced here, particularly as the data spreads are consistent within and between the variables displayed. Whilst this does not imply that improving the quality of such services will not enhance the overall image and operational capability of a museum, it does suggest that any such provision is likely to be viewed as being subservient to the museums more central operational images as far as audience selection is concerned. Presenting things about the present, not just the past is similarly under-favoured, only 16 percent of the total sample considering that this would improve their chances of making a visit. This view accords well with the overall image that museums are preservers and interpreters of the past. A clear distinction is made in the publics mind: the concept of the displaying of contemporary material is at odds with one of the museums perceived and accepted primary roles. By providing more advertising about what museums actually do and whats in them, current visitor profiles are likely to be reinforced. Even though only 31 percent considered that this would enhance the likelihood of making a visit in any event, it is favoured more by regular visitors, presumably as an aid to visit planning. . . The provrslon of special and temporary exhibitions as a stimulus to visit choice has a similar outcome to that of increasing rates of advertising. An average 27 percent consider this would enhance their chances of making a visit, with highly significant differences in favour of regular visitors. Clearly, a changing environment appeals more to those who visit museums in the first instance, and echoes the alternative view held by non-visitors (noted above) that museums never change. The contemporary view of the increasing use of video and film in museums as visit stimulators does not gain much support from this survey: only an average 22 percent thought that their availability would enhance the chance of making a visit. Once again, the significant differences are in favour of reinforcing the currently observed visitor mix.

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits

The key improvement that would be favoured as a visit-stimulator more than any other (46 percent of the total sample), would be the provision of workshops where I can see people making and doing things. Whilst even this would serve only to reinforce the existing patterns, it is favoured more by current non-visitors than any of the other potential improvements suggested. This is probably the most immediately accessible type of interpretation available to museums under normal operating environments, and would appear to have the most potential as far as widening the visitor mix is concerned. Conclusions This article began by seeking to explore aspects of the audience selection process from two main origins: the perceived nature and characteristics of museums as social institutions and visit destinations; and the nature and characteristics of the public formulating such perceptions. It established a theoretical perspective on the development and maintenance of pro-museum selection attitudes within the wider concept of behavioural consistency in visitor attraction, and used a broadened definition of the museum audience by including potential visitors as part of the appraisal of observed visit/non-visit patterns. Although based on a county-wide survey, the findings have a wider relevance to all museums and associated institutions. The survey results are supportive of the widely held view that museum visits are made by an unrepresentative sample of the available population, and used class groups to identify the most likely visitor mix in terms of socio-demographic background and profile. A new method of exploring institutional audience commonality, the index of audience convergence, was developed to determine clusters of visit destinations drawing support from similar visitor pools. Exploring these visit destinations in terms of institutional matching allowed common constructs to be deduced that reinforced the proximity of these destinations in conceptual terms. A crucial finding is that both museum visitors and non-visitors share a common, underlying perspective on the nature and characteristics of museums and the roles they perform on behalf of society which is fundamentally similar to the professional, curatorial viewpoint. Differences do occur, however, in the value placed upon these perceptions that underpin elements of the audience selection process and that help maintain the currently observed visitor/non-visitor balance. This was found to be particularly important in relation to the value placed upon education and therefore, by transfer, on formalized institutions seen to be part of the wider educational system. Seeking a more representative audience base is therefore a complex problem that needs to be addressed by museums, bearing in mind that the continued, successful communication of their roles and aspirations to the general public is unlikely to be successful in this regard. Acknowledgements Thanks are due to all those involved in the 1988 Lincolnshire survey, including the members of the survey team, the staff of the museums service and the members of the public who gave up their time to be interviewed. Thanks are also due to Bernadette Higgins-McLaughlin as co-author of the original research report. Even with all this help, any errors of interpretation lie with the author.

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Notes and References

1. See, for example, A New Museum Every Fortnight, The London Evening Standard, 22 April 1987. The Museums Associations definition of a museum. accented bv its 1984 annual conference is an institution which collects, documents, preserves, exhibik and interprets material evidence and associated information for the public benefit. The Museums Association (1984). Definition of a Museum, Museums Bulletin, 24(8): 142. D. R. Prince et al. (eds), Manual of 3. G. D. Lewis (1984). Chapters 2-3 in J. M. A. Thompson, Curatorship: A Guide to Museum Practice. London: Butterworths/The Museums Association. 4. D. A. Bassett (1984). Chapter 50 in J. M. A. Thompson, D. R. Prince et al. (eds), op. cit. Note 3. 5. G. D. Lewis (1984). Chapter 1 in J. M. A. Thompson, D. R. Prince et al. (eds), op. cit. Note 3. 6. D. R. Prince and B. A. Higgins-McLaughlin (1987). Museums UK: The Findings of the Museums Data-Base Project. London: The Museums Association. 7. Ibid. written reply by the Arts Minister, Richard Lute MP, June 1989, reported in The 8. Commons Guardian, London and Manchester 27 June 1989. (1987). Op. cit. Note 6. 9. D. R. Prince and B. A. Higgins-McLaughlin statement as President of The Museums Association, in The 10. See, for example, Ian Robertsons Financial Times, 6 June 1986. (1988). Financial Support for Museums, in The Museums Yearbook 11. The Museums Association 1988/89. London: The Museums Association. 12. D. R. Prince and B. A. McLaughlin (1987), op. cit. Note 6. In the survey returns over 25 different types of adminstrative body were recorded. established in 1931. 13. The Museums and Galleries Commission, Museums, The Museum 14. For example, The Museums Association, The Association of Independent Professionals Group and Women, Heritage and Museums. 15. M. B. Ah (1977). Four Years of Visitor Surveys at the British Museum (Natural History) 1976-79, Museums Journal, 80(l): 10-19. R. F. Miles and A. F. Tout (1978). Human Biology and the New Exhibition Scheme in the British Museum (Natural History), Curator, 21(l): 36-50. (1989). Museum Lines: The Findings of the 1988 16. D. R. Prince and B. A. Higgins-McLaughlin Lincolnshire County Museums Visitor and Non-Visitor Survey. Prince Research Consultants Limited, London and Department of Recreational Services, Lincolnshire County Council, Lincoln. The study, undertaken by Prince Research Consultants Limited was commissioned by Lincolnshire County Council with the financial support of the East Midlands Area Museum Service. The Image of the Museum: a Case-Study of Kingston 17. D. R. Prince and R. T. Schadla-Hall(l985). upon Hull, Museums Journal, 81(l): 39-45. (1989). Op. cit. Note 16. Interviews took place at 18. D. R. Prince and B. A. Higgins-McLaughlin seventeen locations in the county. Museums: The City County (Lincoln), The Usher Art Gallery (Lincoln), The Museum of Lincolnshire Life (Lincoln), Gainsborough Old Hall, Grantham Museum, Stamford Museum, Church Farm Museum (Skegness); On-street: Lincoln Castle/ Cathedral, The Stonebow Lincoln, and at central locations in Grantham, Stamford, Gainsborough, Skegness, Boston, Louth, Horncastle and Sleaford. In all, 2277 successful questionnaire-contacts were made over 315 interview man-days occupying the period from January to September 1988. The questionnaire sought to elicit four specific clusters of information in ways that allowed cross-tabulation and the application of statistical techniques designed to assess association and significance: L. (a) profile questions enabling the identification of the respondent against a range of socio-economic and demographic variables; (b) behavioural questions aimed at placing the visit to the museum within the respondents general use of available leisure time; (c) cognitive questions related to the respondents current knowledge of the Countys museums; and (d) affective questions related to the respondents current image of the Countys (and other) museums. Two main versions of the questionnaire were produced to cater for at-museum and on-street interviewing, the core information being common to both. In sum, 28 questions explored 86 variables for each museum-visiting respondent, the numbers being correspondingly less for the on-street samples as the visit-specific questions were excluded.

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Factors Influencing Museum Visits Data were coded and analysed in-house by PRC. Primary tests of association and significance were undertaken, where appropriate, using cross-tabulations to produce contingency tables analysed through a variety of non-parametric statistical procedures. Confidence levels were set at 0.050 for all non-parametric, including chi-square, calculations. For the sake of clarity, detailed statistical observations have been kept to a minimum in this paper. International Journal of Museum Management and R. S. Miles (1986). Museum Audiences, Curatorship, 1(l): 73-80. D. R. Prince (1985). The Museum as Dreamland, International Journal of Museum Management and Curatorship, 4(3): 243-250. D. P. Ausubel (1963), The Psychology of M eaningful Verbal Learning. New York: Grune & Stratton. D. R. Prince (1985). Op. cit. Note 20. S. A. Griggs and K. Hays-Jackson (1983). Visitors Perceptions of Cultural Institutions, Museums Journal, 83(2/3): 121-125. D. R. Prince (1985). Museum Visiting and Unemployment, Museums Journal, 85(2): 85-90. P. W. Digby (1974). Visitors to Three London Museums. London: HMSO. P. S. Doughty (1968). The Public of the Ulster Museum: a Statistical Survey, Museums Journal, 68(l): 19-25; and 68(2): 47-53. B. McWilliams and J. Hopwood (1973). The Public of Norwich Castle Museum, Museums Journal, 72(4): 153-156. T. Mason (1974). The Visitors to Manchester Museum: a Questionnaire Survey, Museums Journal, 73(4): 153-157. Warrington and Runcorn Development Corporation (1982). Survey of Visitors to Norton Priory Museum. Runcom: Warrington Development Corporation. D. R. Prince and R. T. Schadla-Hall(1985). Op. cit. Note 17 These groups are based on the approach adopted by Heath et al. in their examination of voting patterns and allegiences. A. Heath, R. J owe11 and J. Curtice (1985). How Britain Votes. Oxford: Pergamon Press. D. R. Prince (1983). Behavioural Consistency and Visitor Attraction, International Journal of Museum Management and Curatorship, 2(3): 235-247. The Museums Association (1982). The M useums Yearbook 1982. London: The Museums Association. (a) The value-words and statements used were: Museums are: Boring, Educational, Old-Fashioned, Really only for children, Something I like to do, For intellectuals only, Entertaining, Interesting. A museum never changes, when you have seen it once youve seen it enough. You get more out of a visit to a museum or art gallery when you are on holiday. Museums make people feel proud of their heritage. Museums would be a lot better if there were more things for people to actually do. Museums are good places to take children and young people. Museums are really places for the benefit of scholars and other highly educated people. To really appreciate a museum, you have to know something about it before you go in. Museums do an invaluable job in protecting our heritage. Museums are old, fusty places, out of touch with today. Museums are a waste of rate-payers money. (b) Stated improvements:

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

26. 27. 28. 29. 30.

31. 32. 33.

Open longer hours, especially in the evening. Provide more advertising about what museums actually do and whats in them. Provide better cafes and restaurants. Make the shops more attractive, with a better range of goods to buy. Make the exhibitions look inviting and friendlier. Show more things about the present, not just the past. Have more exhibitions about local things. Provide workshops where I can see people making and doing things. Have more special and temporary exhibitions. Show more films and videos in the museum. and L. Brook (1989). British Social Attitudes: Special International 34. R. Jowell, S. Witherspoon Report. London: Gower Publishing.