Exhibit appraisal and diverse populations: Pilot research about intersectional and science identities in science exhibits

作为在非正式环境中加强学习的总体战略的一部分，推进非正式STEM学习(AISL)计划为各种环境中使用的创新研究、方法和资源提供资金。这个项目将探索了解参观者对科学博物馆展品的体验如何有助于增加不同观众的参与度。博物馆在理解展览设计如何支持代表不足的观众方面取得了很大进展，但往往倾向于关注个别人口群体，如女性、某些种族和少数民族以及残疾人。这个项目将探索访问者的人口统计和科学身份之间的关系，以评估使用科学身份作为跨部门代理的负担能力，这可能有助于该领域超越对人口统计的依赖。该项目基于美国国家科学基金会之前关于博物馆参与的研究，将评估理论应用到非正式学习环境中。评估理论是一种心理学模型，涉及人们如何对表现为情绪的情况进行有意识和潜意识的评估。到目前为止，博物馆倾向于关注参与的认知和行为方面。评价理论可以将情感过程添加到对参与的概念理解中，并可以应用于帮助展览专业人员开发支持复杂身份的设计框架。这样的框架可能会对博物馆、学校和其他教育背景下的学习体验的包容性设计产生影响。这项试点和可行性研究将解决有关研究方法可行性的方法论和理论问题，该研究方法考虑了以下关系：1)展品设计特征；2)多重认同因素，包括科学认同、人口统计学和自我定义的个人认同；3)参观者评价；以及4)参与展品。该项目由波士顿科学博物馆和EdTogether的研究人员领导，EdTogether是一家致力于包容性设计的非营利性研究和开发组织，该项目将从预试阶段开始，在此期间，研究人员将与当地社区组织的青年和专业顾问合作，测试一套数据收集方法，包括以问卷和采访形式的自我报告；观察参观者的参与度；以及生物特征数据收集，包括皮肤电流反应和眼球跟踪。从这一前期试验阶段开始，该团队将进行四项小型研究，这些研究将反复改进措施，以提高有效性和简洁性，同时收集数据，以测试调查人员对设计、身份、评估和参与的假设模型。通过四项小型研究测试该模型的证据将为更大规模的研究奠定基础，该研究旨在探索交叉身份、科学身份、评估和参观者参与之间的因果关系。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of settings. This project will explore how understanding visitors' experiences with science museum exhibits may contribute to increasing engagement among diverse audiences. Museums have made great strides in understanding how exhibit design can support underrepresented audiences, but often tend to focus on individual demographic groups such as females, certain racial and ethnic minorities, and people with disabilities. This project will explore relationships between visitors' demographic and science identities to assess the affordances of using science identity as an intersectional proxy that could help the field move beyond its reliance on demographics. Building on prior National Science-funded work about museum engagement, the project applies appraisal theory--a psychological model about how people make conscious and subconscious assessments of situations that manifest in emotions--to the informal learning context. To date, museums have tended to focus on cognitive and behavioral aspects of engagement. Appraisal theory can add emotional processes to the conceptual understanding of engagement, and can be applied to help exhibit professionals develop a design framework that upholds complex identities. Such a framework could have implications for inclusive design of learning experiences in museums, schools, and other educational contexts.This Pilot and Feasibility Study will address methodological and theoretical questions about the feasibility of a research approach that considers the relationships among: 1) exhibit design features; 2) multiple identity factors including science identity, demographics, and self-defined personal identity; 3) visitor appraisals; and 4) engagement with exhibits. Led by researchers at the Museum of Science, Boston and EdTogether, a non-profit research and development organization for inclusive design, the project will begin with a pre-piloting phase during which researchers will work with youth and professional advisors from local community organizations to test a suite of data collection approaches including self-report in the form of questionnaires and interviews; observations of visitor engagement; and biometric data collection including galvanic skin response and eye tracking. Building from this pre-piloting phase, the team will conduct four mini-studies that will iteratively refine measures towards enhanced validity and parsimony while gathering data to test the investigators' hypothesized model of design, identity, appraisal, and engagement. The evidence from testing this model through the four mini-studies will lay the foundation for larger-scale research that intends to explore causal relationships among intersectional identities, science identities, appraisal, and visitor engagement.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.