Approach any museum-going parent or caregiver on the floor of your museum and ask them why they are there. I bet you they say things like the museum is educational, fun for kids, and/or it is a good place for the family to visit. All fantastic reasons for visiting.

But those reasons, wonderful as they are, don't really help us understand what the impact of museums are for children or their caregivers. Why? Well, impact is harder to articulate. It is harder to see. Parents and caregivers can see their kids learning and having fun, but to extrapolate out to what impact those new learnings have, well, that's harder.

Yet it matters. Deeply. Hardly anyone questions that museums are educational (97% of Americans agree they are, as we found when I did public polling for AAM). But lots of experiences are educational. Thus,  if we need to make a case for why museums matter (and we do), we need to not only say we are educational, but why what we do is better than other experiences, delivering better impact.

In the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers it was important to get a better handle on impact by building on the 2017 Survey's open-ended question on impact (The overall results will be explored more thoroughly in research releases to come.)

When it comes to impact, 70% of parents said that museums helped make them more curious about the world, their top choice. This was followed by "more knowledgeable" and "more well-rounded/broadened horizons."

But the curiosity thing was, well, curious. And that's because it isn't an explicit motivation.

That is, only 21% of parents of children 10 and younger chose "curiosity" as a motivation for visiting museums … yet it was the most important impact of museums, with 71% choosing it. 

Additionally, 94% of these parents say it is more important for museums to cultivate curiosity than help children perform better academically.

So what's going on? Clearly, curiosity isn't the quick-to-articular motivation for visiting museums. Those other reasons (learning, fun, family time) are more immediate, pressing, and motivating. Curiosity, while a highly valued impact, isn't any of those things but instead takes a lifetime to cultivate and benefit from.

The immediacy of those other things, and the longer-term horizon of curiosity, creates an impact/articulation gap that turns out to be really important, especially when we back up and examine this more broadly.

To start, while only 6% of museum-going parents said it was more important for museums to focus on academic achievement than curiosity, 26% of the broader population of parents said likewise. Looking at that 26% of the broader population of parents, and also the 6% of museum-going parents, was illuminating. In both samples, these respondents were significantly less likely to have a college degree. Additionally, among the museum-goers, they were nearly three times more likely to be parents of color (even when controlling for education). Both groups were also significantly less likely to cite curiosity as an impact of museums overall.

The marked difference in education in both groups (and likely, by extension, socio-economic status) is troubling, as is the difference between whites and people of color. I don't know why the difference, and I say that because I haven't asked. That is something that absolutely needs to be done.

I do, however, have a hypothesis. It is easy for well-educated museum-going parents (who are also overwhelmingly white) to say that curiosity is a necessity. That having a curious outlook yields better outcomes in life (which research does tend to support). But curiosity is expensive. It is expensive to nurture because it is an ever-hungry beast that needs resources to feed it. It needs museum visits, books, camps, and supplies. It also needs adult time and energy to feed. All of those cost parents and guardians in some way, and that makes nurturing curiosity a privilege that some parents have capacity to provide, but many cannot. (I've written some about capacity before; it bears reviewing.)

For those who are working hard to take care of their families, but have limited capacities to do more due to external constraints in their lives, it would be easy to see a direct line between academic achievement and better outcomes … even if that direct line doesn't directly take into account what motivates someone to achieve in the first place. And for respondents of color, I hypothesize that the negative economic outcomes resulting from systemic racism may have a similar result, even when educational attainment does reach the highest levels.

I also realize, however, that my hypotheses may be misguided or wrong. If so, and you have your own hypotheses, I encourage you to share them with me so that future phases of research can incorporate those ideas as well.

But given the essential birthright all of us have to curiosity, if my hypothesis is correct, it is incumbent on museums to do more to provide more opportunities to more children to cultivate curiosity … and thus benefit from it over a lifetime. That is, after all, one of the most important impacts of our work.

And how? It actually goes back to making it easy. Logistically, of course. We're not easy to visit (as we already know), and that has to get better. Reduced/free admission, such as through Museums for All, is a great start, but it also has to be about access, transportation, being welcoming to all, or going to where parents and caregivers already are. We should not underestimate the time and energy costs of visiting as well.

We also need to be an easy solution for all parents in their need to help their children succeed.
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Some museums are working on this through effective partnerships (looking at you, Discovery Museum in Acton, MA, who was recently featured in the New York Times). We need more … much more … of this. But to increase the curiosity capacity in all children, low-income, middle-class, non-visiting families, and yes, our regular museum-goers we already have, we also need an overall image reboot that represents a new value proposition to parents that we are their easy solution to some of the pressures and obligations they have, as parents, in their lives.

And then we need to make it so.


Do you value this research? Does it help you in your work at your museum? Do you want it to continue to help you and our field?

If so, consider how useful it would be to know how your museum's stakeholders feel about your museum, lifelong learning in museums, and more. By enrolling your museum in the 2019 Annual Survey of Museum Goers, you can easily benchmark the visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographics of your stakeholders. Additionally, you can compare your results to your peers, begin to track them over time, and gain far more contextual information through your custom results and report. The fee for 2019 is only $1,000 per museum. 

And, of course, this difference has big repercussions for adult engagement, long-term connection with the institution, and philanthropic giving over a lifetime. It matters.

​To learn more about the why behind it, however, I recommend my series on intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. Additionally, I just launched a new series on parents and their motivations, with new releases on that topic coming out weekly over the next month.


​A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 

The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. In particular, this question is similar to versions fielded by, among other organizations, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and Analysis, the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture, Visitors Count!, etc.

About a third of young adults without children also chose family time as a primary reason for visiting museums, and their comments indicate that they enjoy visiting them with various family members, but primarily their spouses or significant others (with some saying museums helped them get to know future spouses better).

​Adults over age 60 are the least likely to cite family time; only one in five women, and only one in six men. As Americans age, however, they need social outlets to maintain long-term health and wellness. My data suggests museums are under-performing in this role (for more, see my review of Creative Health on The Curated Bookshelf). 


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A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 

​The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. In particular, this question is similar to versions fielded by, among other organizations, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and Analysis, the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture, Visitors Count!, etc.

• "Museums are the places I go to recharge, seek inspiration, learn, explore, and find beauty.  I often go with friends to enjoy their take on pieces I sometimes did not notice before or to have a different point of view on a piece I already love.  We chat.  We find something we love or hate together. We often imagine ourselves in other places and times."  - young adult museum-goer from 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers​

And with that, I really don't have anything to add! (Though to be honest, I'm more surprised it isn't a bigger motivator for older adults, especially women.)


A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 


The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. In particular, this question is similar to versions fielded by, among other organizations, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and Analysis, the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture, Visitors Count!, etc.

This isn't really a surprise, now is it? In my 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, the  majority of museum-going parents visit museums so that their children have learning opportunities. Overall, it is an extrinsically motivated reason for visiting.

The interesting part is looking at the parents that are intrinsically motivated as well. One doesn't preclude the other, yet look at how few are intrinsically motivated at children's museums and science centers. Only 12%. (And science centers, when I look just at your regular visitors, it only goes up to 18%.)

As I'll lay out in a few weeks, the motivation gap matters. A lot.

Though to be honest, what I'm most curious about is broader population response. They are thinking about all types of museums, not a specific type, and in that context, their response makes a lot of sense; it is almost an average of the responses from my sampling of museum-goers.


A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 



The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. In particular, this question is similar to versions fielded by, among other organizations, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and Analysis, the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture, Visitors Count!, etc.

When I ask museum-goers why they visit museums, learning comes up fairly often. But for whom is rather important.

In my 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, the majority of regular visitors to art and history museums are thinking about their own learning opportunities. But less than one in five regular visitors to children's museums or science centers are. The broader public, thinking of museums in general (and if they were to visit one, why), falls in between, at two in five.

Of course, there are lots of reasons for visiting museums. Such as learning opportunities for children ... which is a much stronger motivation for those regular visitors to children's museums and science centers.

But here's the thing. My "why do you visit" question allowed respondents to pick as many choices as they liked. Parents can choose learning for themselves and for their children; one doesn't preclude the other. (There were several other options as well. I'll get to all of them, promise.)

Because that's what driving the difference here. Since the super-majority of regular visitors to children's museums and science centers are parents (primarily of children 10 and younger), we see what I call The Parent Bubble: a large influx of extrinsically-motivated parents who may or may not have any intrinsic motivations for visiting for their own sake.  Now, I love that they are seeing museums as a good thing for their kids, but as we'll see in a few weeks, The Parent Bubble presents a lot of challenges for museums.

One more thing. This question was designed to capture those easy-to-articular reasons for visiting museums. But using this answer as an example, it doesn't tell us why they picked museums over other learning opportunities. That takes deeper probing. More to come.



A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 



The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. In particular, this question is similar to versions fielded by, among other organizations, the Smithsonian's Office of Policy and Analysis, the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture, Visitors Count!, etc.

A museum's ability to affect someone in a meaningful way is closely tied to that individual's willingness to learn … and openness to new ideas and concepts.

That's a complicated statement. Allow me to repeat it.

A museum's ability to affect someone in a meaningful way is closely tied to that individual's willingness to learn … and openness to new ideas and concepts.

It's about mindset. And it means that the impact of museums disproportionately affects some visitors more than others.

Over the past few weeks, I've shared some findings from the 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers about intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivations in museum-going. But how does that affect impact?

When I asked museum-goers to share with me their assessment of the value of museums in their life, there were clear differences based on their motivations around learning.


Intrinsically motivated museum-goers

These avid museum-goers were much more likely to share impacts that were about the societal benefits of museums. That is, they spoke often about minds being opened, connections engendered, understanding developed, and how museums contribute significantly to a sense of place. Overall, their comments were richer and more detailed, with more nuance and emotion.

They also spoke of personal benefits, and were about twice as likely to say museums made them more curious, enriched them, or were good for their mental health. Additionally, many made general statements about museums. In both cases, these types of answers were more likely to be in addition to the societal benefits.

Two randomly selected examples:

• "They have helped me understand other cultures; allowed me to experience beauty in many forms; broadened my world view; and taught me much about life- now and in the past."
• "Museums give you a sense of both continuities and changes over time.  They open your mind to endless contemplation of all the relationships, both within a given period between various aspects of each culture, and between cultures and over time. Connecting and patterns in material culture, economics, environment, science and politics and how each influences the others is the most rewarding kind of learning and museums do that best."

Extrinsically motivated museum-goers

First, extrinsically-motivated museum-goers were more likely to skip my question entirely. Response rates fell from 72% of intrinsically-motivated museum-goers to only 57% of the most extrinsically motivated.  Fewer of them were able to comment in the first place, which is telling.

When it came to those who did respond, there were two areas where they particularly stood out.

1 - They were about 60% more likely to focus on museums being beneficial to their children. (Note: I distinguished between those who said museums benefit all children, a societal benefit, from those who said museums benefited their children, a personal benefit.) That means parents responding to the survey are disproportionately extrinsically motivated (something you'll hear a lot more about soon). Randomly selected example of this type of comment:

• "I went often as a child to museums and zoos and now I seek those same opportunities for my children."

2 - They were about a third more likely to mention museums as merely places of learning, without any kind of context for why that mattered (that is, no personal or societal benefit). Randomly selected example of this type of comment:

• "Yes, I've learned many things in/from museums that I would have never learned from school, TV, books."

Given their extrinsic motivations around learning, which is learning to meet a personal need, it isn't a surprise that their responses reflected those needs.  And, indeed, I would argue that I'm thrilled that parents and caregivers choose to visit museums to benefit their children, or that some museum-goers value the education provided in museums (even if they don't articulate why that learning has mattered to them). They are visiting museums, and that's the most important thing.


Extending meaning-making to all audiences

Deeply meaningful, powerful, even transformative experiences in museums are more likely to happen to those who are intrinsically motivated. This is clear from the types of experiences they have had in museums, and it is also clear from the impact they have derived from those experiences. It is also clear from their mindset, as they typically approach museums with an openness to change, or transformation:

• "At any age even when revisiting an exhibit be it in an art, or history or science museum each time I approach the exhibit I get a fresh perspective that speaks to me to tell me how much I've changed as a human being. When approached from this perspective the experience becomes a dialog rather than a static clinical exhibition."

​But therein lies a challenge, as it means that we are disproportionately affecting the faithful: the minority of visitors that are intrinsically motivated.

Yet I see this as an opportunity: there is a pretty significant captive audience in our museums, every day, that we can reach.

It's not going to be easy.  After all, what we want to deliver doesn't match up with the actual, most pressing needs of these visitors. A parent or caregiver visiting for their child's enrichment isn't coming in with the mindset that they may have a transformative experience themselves … therefore, they are less likely to.

There is also something else, which you may have ascertained as you read this: life stage matters. It matters a lot. So does socio-economic status, educational attainment, age, and other factors. I have two more research releases on the value of museums, but after that, I'll begin exploring different segments of museum-goers through life stage and demographic lenses. Those lenses will give much more depth and complexity to individual motivations, and the value of museums. They will also give us a better sense of how to measure impact and articulate our value to broader audiences … and attract new audiences along the way by better matching our marketing to their explicit, extrinsic needs.




A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 


The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation. 

One of the things I look at is what I call "museum omnivorousness." That is, how many different museums does an individual or family visit in the course of a year?

Why? It is an indicator of an intrinsic motivation for learning, as those with strong intrinsic motivations tend to go to more museums, more often. More museums theoretically means more engagement, more connection, more impact (and the data does, generally, bear this out).

Overall, in my 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, about 30% of respondents said they visited five or more different museums/year. Statistically, if we are considering this the "avid museum-goer" category (which would be fair enough), that means "avid museum-goers" are visiting a different museum less than once every two months on average. In some ways, sure, that's a lot of time in museums. But in others, not so much. (Heck, there are some months my family does five different museums … and that's not even counting vacations. Granted, we are really weird.)

But there were differences within the data. Those responding to an art or history museum's survey showed more omnivorousness (and more intrinsic motivation as well) than those responding to a children's museum or a science center.

​Why? As you'll see in a few weeks, it pretty much boils down to the extrinsic motivations of what I call "The Parent Bubble," which disproportionately visits children's museums and science centers.

There is something else to keep in mind: these are regular museum-goers, connected enough with museums to receive regular communications from at least one museum, to visit that museum repeatedly, and perhaps to be a member or donor. When I run the data for the broader population of American adults, the number is way lower: a mere 4%. If museums are going to be deeply relevant to more people, it looks like our work is cut out for us.


A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 


The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation.

I am writing this essay from a place a privilege. To be honest, my life has been one of privilege.

It just didn't occur to me that my survey questions on intrinsic and extrinsic motivations around learning might reflect that privilege. That having an intrinsic motivation to learn might be rooted in class. After all, everyone goes to school, right?

But I was wrong. Naïve. I realize it now.

As I began to analyze the data from the 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, I started to see patterns that first surprised me, and then made me head slap myself:

1. Intrinsically motivated individuals were about 25% more likely to have been raised in a college-educated household; and
2. People of color, overall, had lower rates of intrinsic motivation

And then, when I was hand-coding written-in comments, this:

"Question 21 poses another ridiculous choice: it is easy for me, a well-educated white person, to believe that jobs should be chosen based on self-fulfillment rather than on income, but have you asked this question to many poor or uneducated people?"

That survey respondent was absolutely right … and the same thing goes for reasons to pursue higher education. To say "learn for learning's sake" assumes the job and compensation will be there as well. And that is an assumption many cannot afford to make, as their life experiences has shown them. It is an assumption that comes from privilege.
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In theory, having an intrinsic motivation to learn shouldn't have anything to do with socio-economic status (SES), or race, or ethnicity. But when a family is struggling to make ends meet, when work is hard, perhaps unrewarding, and a means to an end for shelter, food, and other necessities, well, it is completely understandable why extrinsic motivations drive learning. It's an illustration of Maslow's hierarchy.

Why? Having (or cultivating) an intrinsic motivation to learn requires resources. Resources of time, energy, and money. Libraries have done amazing work to nurture intrinsic motivations at no cost, but it still takes time and energy to go to the library in the first place. And museums … even more so as we typically take even more time and energy to visit (think transportation, time) and have an admission fee (and transportation costs). Other activities that those with intrinsic motivations enjoy also have relatively high costs of time, energy, and money.

So if museums are really going to matter to more people, and if we want to cultivate an intrinsic motivation to learn, we need to think long and hard about how we are going to accomplish that. Harvard professor of economics Sendhil Mullainathan suggests working proactively to give more children educational tailwinds … as doing so can "solve many otherwise intractable problems" by keeping children in school longer, with the many positive impacts that generates.  For museums, that means taking our museum to where those children are, in ways that are welcomed and easy … and fulfilling their family's extrinsic motivations. That likely means more programs in neighborhood health clinics, laundromats, and food banks. More take-home activity kits packed into weekend food backpacks. It also likely means fewer new museum buildings or wings. 

Personally, I'm thinking long and hard about how I will use these survey questions in the future. Understanding individual underlying motivations, and whether they are intrinsic and/or extrinsic, is incredibly important for understanding how museums can make a difference in more lives. These questions worked rather well for that purpose, but I'm going to keep testing new questions that I can use to capture the nuance around motivations in more sensitive ways. Your thoughts and advice are welcome.



A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 

Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 


The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation.

This research release is a continuation of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations and Museums: Part I, and is rooted in my recent research, including the 2017 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers and broader population samples I ran in the fall of 2016 and spring of 2017.

People visit museums for lots of reasons. We all know that. And when we ask visitors why they visit, there are a few reasons that come up often.  They visit for family time. Because they want to see something at the museum. For fun. For learning experiences. To bring out of town guests. And so on.

What visitors don't say are things like "I have a strong intrinsic motivation to learn." Or "I don't really like museums, but I think it is important for my kids to come to get a leg up on school." (As you'll see as my research unfolds, both valid reasons for visiting, though I am admittedly giving extreme examples.)

Yet the difference between these two reasons, and others I am uncovering, are huge. Especially, around impact, which I'll discuss in a future research release.

To begin to sort through all of this, and why it matters to museums, let's step back and focus on breaking down the population so that we have a sense of how it plays out overall. I'll include comments on how it affects museum visitation.

First, as I mentioned in an earlier research release, motivations around learning are not a zero-sum game. Even the most intrinsically motivated person likely has extrinsic motivations for learning (such as making a living). And there's a good chunk of the population that is intrinsically motivated at some level, but extrinsic motivations are stronger. But generally, I think it is fair to break down the population this way:

Broadly, that means three segments of the population.

1. Extrinsically motivated, reactive. Two sub-groups are in this group:

1. Individuals who see learning as such hard work (in psychology terms, a "low need for cognition," and they are at the lowest end), they don't seek it out. Even when they know it could help them. Learning is something that happens when it is required of them (compulsory attendance at school; training for a specific job).
2. Some individuals who would value learning, and be proactive about it, if they had to time, energy, or money to think about it and do so. (This is a smaller group.)

Overall, this group is extremely, extremely hard to conduct research on, as they rarely (if ever) take surveys. Why? Two reasons: 1 - since they don't seek out information unless absolutely necessary (or, for some, because they have no time to be proactive about it), they are not likely to be on any lists, or be intercepted by an online survey; and 2 - surveys are not something they are inclined to participate in anyway. They are a huge part of what I refer to as the "blind spot," or survey bias that means practically no survey truly represents the population. I don't have a strong sense of the size of this population, but if I had to guess, I would guess about a third of American adults, maybe more. (BTW, they don't visit museums.)

2. Extrinsically motivated, proactive. Individuals that place a value on learning, even a very high value on learning, but primarily as a means to an end to reach one or more goals in their life. And they are proactive about it through both formal education and informal means. So going to college to get a good job. Training programs for a better job that can better support a family. Learning to fit in with a social group. Learning to gain approval (such as that of a parent). And so on. Learning isn't necessarily their favorite thing to do (we could probably put it in the same category as vegetables and exercise; good for you, ok to do, but not necessarily relished by many). But these individuals have good, even excellent reasons for actively seeking out learning, and do so when those learning opportunities meet their needs. That can mean museums, whether sporadically, casually, or often (indeed, some of our most avid museum-goers are highly extrinsically motivated). But if museums are not meeting their needs, there is no reason to visit (as you'll see, this is a HUGE issue). My estimate for this segment of the population? About 50% - 60%.

Note: Some of the extrinsically motivated, proactive learners may also have rather strong intrinsic motivations around learning. For some, in certain subject areas they enjoy. For others, generally. What I'm looking at is their overall motivations around learning, and for this category, those individuals who are more extrinsically motivated than intrinsically motivated.

3. Intrinsically motivated, proactive. Individuals who love to learn for its own sake. Who find learning pleasurable, enlightening, relaxing (in psychological terms, having a "high need for cognition"). Highly curious individuals. These individuals seek out learning opportunities often because they like to think. They read for pleasure (including literary fiction, nonfiction). And they are the biggest fans of museums. Museum-going happens for them throughout their lifetimes, regardless of the presence of children in their lives (a distinction that matters). In fact, I think it is fair to say that museums have cornered this market. My estimate for this segment of the population? I have 6% in my research notes, but let's estimate 5%, maybe slightly higher.

Now, there is an important issue here we can't ignore. Valuing learning primarily for its own sake more than for extrinsic economic reasons may be related to class … and an assumption that the good job will come with it.  Thus, socio-economic status, capacity (time, money, energy) to pursue learning, and also race and ethnicity all affect learning motivations. That tricky dissection is coming in my next research release.

Additionally, I want to go back to something I just said about the intrinsically motivated. That we've "cornered this market." That's really important because it means that since they already know us, love us, and seek us out. There is no potential audience growth here, and our marketing really doesn't matter to them because they are actively searching us out anyway. But at only about a twentieth of the population, they can't sustain museums (and nor would we want to serve only them, obviously).

No, our focus needs to be on extrinsically motivated, proactive individuals, which is the segment of greatest potential growth. They put a high value of learning, and thus we are well-positioned to serve them well. But only if we present our value on their terms, meeting their needs. Some extrinsically motivated individuals (primarily parents of young children) inherently get this, and visit museums regularly. But most don't find the value of museums to be worth it (as much as it pains me to write that). You'll be hearing a lot more about this in the coming weeks.



A note about fielding research. I hold dear the idea that research for the field, about the field, should be shared with the field. But that only works when museums work together to make it possible. Since individual museums are needed to field this work, the survey also benefits participating museums on an individual level by providing benchmark data on visitation rates, motivations, attitudes and preferences, and demographic questions … all of which can then be tracked over time in the future. Participating museums are also allowed to add 1 - 2 custom questions specific to their needs. 
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Which means if you value this research,  want more of it in the coming years, and want to track your own museum's progress over time, please support this work by enrolling your museum in the 2018 Annual Survey of Museum Goers. The fee for 2018 is only $1,000 per museum. 


The questions for this survey have been inspired by ongoing conversations within the museum field (who does/does not go to museums, why they do/do not visit, and what that means for communities) and ongoing research in the fields of education and psychology around lifelong learning and intrinsic motivation.