The Effects of Visitor Perceptions of Museums and Task Preference on Learning from Museum Exhibits

This paper discusses a research study that examined the effect of providing, or not providing, museum visitors with specific tasks for learning, in relationship to the visitor's task preference. This study was carried out at the Florida Museum of Natural History and made us of 11 static case exhibits, all of which addressed an aspect of Florida vertebrate or invertebrate biology. Findings from the study are reviewed as they pertain to the effects of visitor perceptions of museums and task preference.