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Introduction
In the last decade, museums have been struggling due to increased competition and are scrambling for funds due to a reduction in government support (American Association of Museums, 2012). This explains why museums are becoming increasingly market-oriented, paying greater attention to the wishes and needs of their visitors and the experience that they are in search of. A good example of how museums are reorienting their offer toward the visitors’ needs and desires is the Dallas Museum of Art. Here, a stage was placed in the centre of the main gallery (with continuing music, dance and dramatic performances) and workshops on the cuisine of Normandy and art history lectures were organised with the aim of delivering experiences and bringing the exhibition to life (Sheets, 2010). Museums have been starting to also use information and communications technologies (ICTs), social media and augmented reality to enhance experiences for visitors and non-visitors alike and to engage patrons (American Association of Museums, 2012). Quite recently, Sukiennice museum in Poland made use of smartphones and quick response (QR) codes to bring paintings to life and to avoid the stigma that museums are boring, as is often the case, especially when young visitors are considered. Specifically, at Sukiennice, visitors can use their mobile phone to scan the paintings; when they do so, it uses augmented reality to act out scenes from the paintings. These and other initiatives are examples of how museums, to maintain their competitiveness, are changing the way they approach their target, becoming more able to deliver experiences and to inspire emotions than effectively present “objectives.”
As recently stated by Sheng and Chen (2012, p. 53):
In modern times, museums serve the functions of collection, research and exhibition, as well as education and recreation. They have gradually acquired visitor-based roles instead of museum based roles. Thus, the need for visitor studies has emerged.
This shift from product orientation to consumer orientation has been longer to come for researchers interested in museums than in any other tourism service. Indeed, among the many tourism experiences, museums “are relatively under-researched in the tourism management field” (Siu et al., 2013, p. 293). Nevertheless, this double function (knowledge and entertainment) corresponds to the twofold approach to modern consumer behaviour: cognitive and affective...