I Sho U: An Innovative Method For Museum Visitor Evaluation

This chapter proposes innovations in evaluation techniques that will help us understand visitor cognition in large-scale interactive immersive visualization environments (IIVEs). I Sho U (literally “I Show You”) is a design-led method for encouraging visitors to engage with the evaluation directly inside the space of experience. This research enhances current visitor evaluation methodologies by developing visitor agency. It is applicable for large and diverse visitor communities, in a range of museum contexts. I Sho U compiles quantitative data about a qualitative experience and this data is visible in real-time to participants and to stakeholders (such as curatorial staff and exhibition developers). This ongoing research is being undertaken by the Laboratory for Innovation Galleries, Labraries, Archive and Museums (iGLAM), College of Fine Arts, University of New South West (UNSW) in collaboration with design research at Swinburne University, Australia. The case study introduced in this chapter used five I Sho U interfaces at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum, deployed for visitors engaged with two IIVEs (see the two Pacifying the South China Sea Pirates projects (2013) in Chapter 13). While the methods discussed here are using IIVEs for prototyping purposes, the application is easily reconfigured for any situation or museum context. I Sho U is ultimately applicable to the entire situated experience of going to a museum irrespective of the nature of the content on display.