Front-End Evaluation: Places of Invention Exhibition

In preparation for the development of the NSF-funded exhibition Places of Invention, the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History (NMAH) contracted Randi Korn & Associates, Inc. (RK&A) to conduct a front-end evaluation. The study explored interest in, misconceptions of, and potential barriers to the content in the Places of Invention exhibition, which tells stories of historic and modern communities where people, resources, and spaces have come together to spark inventiveness. RK&A conducted 50 in-depth interviews with walk-in visitor groups, including both adults and children, in the current Lemelson Center exhibition at NMAH, Invention at Play. The interviewers asked visitors to comment on various ideas and materials related to the exhibition content, including brief descriptions of three places of invention-Hartford, CT, a 19th-century hub for precision manufacturing industries; 1930s-1940s Hollywood, CA during the golden age of advances in sound and color film; and 1970s Bronx, NY, the birthplace of hip-hop technology and culture-and a list of characteristics or skills that the Lemelson Center associates with places of invention. Overall, visitors responded well to preliminary ideas for the Places of Invention exhibition. The topic of the exhibition prompted some visitors to initially think about invention and places of invention in traditional ways (e.g. airplanes, the Wright Brothers, and Kitty Hawk); however, visitors are mostly amenable to thinking about invention in new ways. For instance, the majority of visitors were excited by and interested in each place of invention presented to them, and some explicitly commented that they liked thinking about invention in new ways and were surprised by some of the places shown. However, there were some naysayers who felt that the places shown to them were not places of invention because they did not agree with what the Center had identified as inventions. For example, the Bronx received the push-back from visitors because they did not consider hip-hop to be an invention. Some visitors found personal relevance in the exhibition by seeing either their place of residence, hometown, or industry represented in the exhibition content. Furthermore, visitors see how characteristics in places of invention, such as problem solving and creativity, connect to the places of invention, and they see how these same characteristics are important to their personal and professional lives, particularly problem solving, communication, and creativity. The Lemelson Center should consider how to clearly express its definition of invention and places of invention to best set visitors' expectations regarding the exhibition. Also, there are specific considerations for presenting each place of inventions, such as by showing connections between the Bronx and contemporary society to help visitors see hip-hop's broad relevance or presenting the manufacturing process as invention (versus the products manufactured) through imagery or activities that focus on precision tools and how a product is made. Additionally, personal relevance is important to the exhibition content. Therefore, the Lemelson Center's decision to include various locations and types of invention in the exhibition as well as plans to incorporate an interactive map that will allow visitors to view and/or add hot spots is on the right track. These plans allow greater opportunities for visitors to find personal relevance in the exhibition. Additionally, emphasizing the relationship between characteristics of places of invention may serve as one way to help visitors feel like they are or can be part of a place of invention.

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