The push for interactives is big in our industry. As a design firm, we are consistently asked by clients to include some form of interactivity for their visitors. But what does that mean exactly? The term “interactive” is very broad. In its simplest form, it is used to enhance interpretation, discussion, and learning, but the way in which we design that can vary greatly. There are certain ‘design sensibilities’ that inform the development of interactivity. For example:

• Recognizing that social interaction is critical to people’s experience of exhibits and exhibitions. They come with companions and meet others who happen to be there at the same time.

• Providing opportunities for sustained interaction with and around exhibits by offering resources for participants themselves to creatively shape and configure the experience of others, either by changing aspects of the display or by other means.

• Creating spaces for individual, private participation with exhibits and providing individual visitors with resources to examine and make sense of exhibits designed for multi-parties.

(Rethinking interactivity: design for participation in museums and galleries– vom Lehn, Heath, Hindmarsh)

One of the difficulties with interactivity is that it tends to engage primarily the individual user and fails to provoke interaction or collaboration between multiple people. There are numerous factors involved in creating a successful interactive and our industry is starting to see the benefit in studying how visitors react to these activities. Our company is starting to look at different case studies and how we can monitor and study visitor reaction to particular interactives in some of our current exhibits. Has your company performed any of its own case studies pertaining to interactives and social interaction?