Some people out there just won't show an interest in visiting museums - or many other cultural and leisure attractions. Last year the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council commissioned Mori to carry out visitor research, but it did not really tell us anything new: after a decade of cultural organisations focusing on 'access', pretty much the same old correlations exist between leisure habits, income and educational attainment.
But almost as an aside, the Mori report noted that those correlations don't apply to all leisure attractions. Zoos and theme parks appealed to everyone. You might be tempted to write off theme parks as irrelevant to this discussion (perhaps at your peril) but surely not zoos?
They have so much in common with museums - similar origins for example and both see themselves as educational institutions and host school visits in similar quantities. Yet zoos are managing to provide access for all in a way that museums are apparently not.
What visitor research exists on zoos is consistent: the reported reasons for visiting are a desire to see the animals and have a nice day out. Education-related aspirations are mentioned less frequently than by the typical museum visitor, but this doesn't tell us much about the difference between zoos and museums.
Zoo visitors might not view their day out as 'learning' quite so much as museum visitors do for any number of reasons. Coming from more varied educational backgrounds they might not attach value to 'learning experiences' - or see merit in reporting a visit as 'educational', as aspirational museum visitors tend to.
In other words, it might be the visitors that are different, describing their experiences differently, not the educational outcomes.
Some commentators have credited the different response visitors have to zoos to something that the entomologist Edward Wilson defined as biophilia - an innate attraction to living things.
It is true that zoo visitors attempt to communicate with the exhibits in a way they wouldn't dream of doing with items in museums - but at present biophilia is just a descriptor, not an explanation.
Visitor research in zoos is relatively undeveloped and we do not have enough detailed knowledge to be able to use biophilia to design better exhibits or explain the difference between zoos and museums.
While it will take zoos some time to gather enough visitor research data to allow detailed comparisons, maybe there are things worth considering in the meantime.
There are some pretty obvious differences - the collections for one. Think about some of the implications of handling a living collection: reserve collections pretty much don't exist.
Storage is less of an issue than feeding and breeding. The needs of the 'objects' in a zoo are hugely specific - there is no convenient grouping together of 'large mammals' in care terms - or even 'reptiles' or 'invertebrates'.
I'm sure zoo and museum curators would argue that their specialist knowledge keeps their collections alive, but in zoos there is definitely a more literal link. Good zoo collections are developed and maintained for conservation reasons and education reasons - a collection existing for its own sake would attract criticism from all sorts of angles.
Collections are documented, audited and monitored to a level any museum would admire, yet even among the most passionate zoo curators, there is no expectation that a collection can be preserved for longer than a few years.
Museums and zoos both pride themselves on giving access to the 'real thing', but the other principles so treasured in museums seem turned on their heads in a zoo. This has some interesting consequences.
For example, the transience of zoo collections seems to free zoo curators from being too attached to their current charges, forcing them to look instead at the 'big picture'.
Collaborations are the norm, with zoos moving star 'objects' around regularly to support conservation breeding programmes. In other words, zoos manage their collections on a national, even international scale.
In museums this has been talked about for years but never achieved, perhaps because museum curators feel possession and control of their objects in ways that zoo curators never could.
Timescales are also interesting. Museums still talk about perpetuity, and while in the cold light of day 'perpetuity' probably means 'a few hundred years at best', this doesn't seem to be widely discussed or acknowledged.
In zoos, a star animal crops up once in a while and dramatically affects a zoo's fortunes. In the 1850s, Obaysch arrived at London Zoo and was the first hippopotamus seen in Europe since Roman times.
More recently, many of you will remember Chi-Chi the giant panda (now stuffed in the collection of the Natural History Museum) and Guy the gorilla. Zoos have developed a mindset that allows them to capitalise on these opportunities, probably because they know they will not be around for ever - perhaps not even for very long.
Visitors tell us that charismatic species such as tigers, komodo dragons and great apes are highlights of their visit - and a typical zoo strategy is to focus resources on making their best better, and to tell more people about it.
Zoos and museums historically displayed 'stamp collections' - one of everything in a nice neat row. Things have moved on now in both camps. Themed galleries are the norm in museums, with a concept or story linking a series of exhibits displayed in innovative and attractive ways.
Zoos do this to a less developed extent, with the 'Reptile House' or 'Moonlight World' (nocturnal animals) quite common. But there is no doubt that museums currently surpass zoos in this type of interpretive expertise.
Where zoos surpass museums is in creating major exhibits to capitalise on their collections' individual stars. The trend in zoos is to build larger, more attractive enclosures to house and display fewer animals to better effect.
The budget for London Zoo's forthcoming Western Lowland Gorilla exhibit would buy a gallery makeover for even the most aspirational museum. While it will include interpretive displays and supporting species such as smaller monkeys and birds, the whole point of the exhibit is to display a few gorillas to the best effect.
Where are the parallels for this type of display in museums? Considering the incredible stories and iconic objects in museum collections, there aren't many.
The National Gallery has produced several temporary exhibitions showcasing key objects - but is it a coincidence that this is another organisation with a restricted collection, virtually all on show?
Temporary displays in museums tend to be miniature versions of the themed gallery. While this approach works in many ways, are there implications for how the collections are used and understood? Museum staff know which of their objects are particularly important or fascinating - but does the visitor?
Zoos get bored of telling visitors the success stories - for example, how the Arabian oryx was saved from extinction and reintroduced to the wild through the collective action of zoos. But there are always visitors who haven't heard these stories before, and who might doubt that such things could ever be possible.
Could museum curators be bored too, with their added problem of an embarrassment of riches to display? Or perhaps there is an assumption that some objects are so famous that there is nothing more to be said?
Museums do seem spoilt for choice when it comes to displaying their collections and as a result, perhaps see some display options as too 'obvious'.
An increasingly common aspiration of museums is to make their exhibitions 'relevant' to visitors. Perhaps this influences display choices. Maybe it is a direct response to those accusations of elitism that tend to arise from a surface reading of museums' visitor profiles. But are museums playing to their strengths if they try to focus on relevance?
Zoos are acutely aware of the fascination of people for the 'other', the draw of something 'like us but not like us'. Zoos would lose something if they only aimed for relevance. The big cats or the great apes are star turns when it comes to stirring something that feels positively primeval.
But there is plenty of scope for any animal to make an impression. The biggest crowd in London Zoo recently was huddled around an old pig-pen as a sow gave birth to eight piglets. So presumably there is something in the idea of biophilia, the innate attraction of living things.
But farmers (for whom the display would perhaps be 'relevant') don't seem so impressed by a farrowing pig.
London Zoo aims to explore these issues in depth via a series of visitor research projects. Zoos need to target ever scarcer cash resources and continue to attract visitors in an increasingly competitive market.
There is so much that we don't understand well, but visitors clearly know what they want, and for some of them it is zoos rather than museums. Dissecting that further promises to unlock some valuable new knowledge for all of us. mj
Catherine Halcrow is the head of interpretation at the Zoological Society of London, and ex-Science Museum
For information on the Mori visitor research see Museums Journal November 2004, p15 or www.mla.gov.uk
But almost as an aside, the Mori report noted that those correlations don't apply to all leisure attractions. Zoos and theme parks appealed to everyone. You might be tempted to write off theme parks as irrelevant to this discussion (perhaps at your peril) but surely not zoos?
They have so much in common with museums - similar origins for example and both see themselves as educational institutions and host school visits in similar quantities. Yet zoos are managing to provide access for all in a way that museums are apparently not.
What visitor research exists on zoos is consistent: the reported reasons for visiting are a desire to see the animals and have a nice day out. Education-related aspirations are mentioned less frequently than by the typical museum visitor, but this doesn't tell us much about the difference between zoos and museums.
Zoo visitors might not view their day out as 'learning' quite so much as museum visitors do for any number of reasons. Coming from more varied educational backgrounds they might not attach value to 'learning experiences' - or see merit in reporting a visit as 'educational', as aspirational museum visitors tend to.
In other words, it might be the visitors that are different, describing their experiences differently, not the educational outcomes.
Some commentators have credited the different response visitors have to zoos to something that the entomologist Edward Wilson defined as biophilia - an innate attraction to living things.
It is true that zoo visitors attempt to communicate with the exhibits in a way they wouldn't dream of doing with items in museums - but at present biophilia is just a descriptor, not an explanation.
Visitor research in zoos is relatively undeveloped and we do not have enough detailed knowledge to be able to use biophilia to design better exhibits or explain the difference between zoos and museums.
While it will take zoos some time to gather enough visitor research data to allow detailed comparisons, maybe there are things worth considering in the meantime.
There are some pretty obvious differences - the collections for one. Think about some of the implications of handling a living collection: reserve collections pretty much don't exist.
Storage is less of an issue than feeding and breeding. The needs of the 'objects' in a zoo are hugely specific - there is no convenient grouping together of 'large mammals' in care terms - or even 'reptiles' or 'invertebrates'.
I'm sure zoo and museum curators would argue that their specialist knowledge keeps their collections alive, but in zoos there is definitely a more literal link. Good zoo collections are developed and maintained for conservation reasons and education reasons - a collection existing for its own sake would attract criticism from all sorts of angles.
Collections are documented, audited and monitored to a level any museum would admire, yet even among the most passionate zoo curators, there is no expectation that a collection can be preserved for longer than a few years.
Museums and zoos both pride themselves on giving access to the 'real thing', but the other principles so treasured in museums seem turned on their heads in a zoo. This has some interesting consequences.
For example, the transience of zoo collections seems to free zoo curators from being too attached to their current charges, forcing them to look instead at the 'big picture'.
Collaborations are the norm, with zoos moving star 'objects' around regularly to support conservation breeding programmes. In other words, zoos manage their collections on a national, even international scale.
In museums this has been talked about for years but never achieved, perhaps because museum curators feel possession and control of their objects in ways that zoo curators never could.
Timescales are also interesting. Museums still talk about perpetuity, and while in the cold light of day 'perpetuity' probably means 'a few hundred years at best', this doesn't seem to be widely discussed or acknowledged.
In zoos, a star animal crops up once in a while and dramatically affects a zoo's fortunes. In the 1850s, Obaysch arrived at London Zoo and was the first hippopotamus seen in Europe since Roman times.
More recently, many of you will remember Chi-Chi the giant panda (now stuffed in the collection of the Natural History Museum) and Guy the gorilla. Zoos have developed a mindset that allows them to capitalise on these opportunities, probably because they know they will not be around for ever - perhaps not even for very long.
Visitors tell us that charismatic species such as tigers, komodo dragons and great apes are highlights of their visit - and a typical zoo strategy is to focus resources on making their best better, and to tell more people about it.
Zoos and museums historically displayed 'stamp collections' - one of everything in a nice neat row. Things have moved on now in both camps. Themed galleries are the norm in museums, with a concept or story linking a series of exhibits displayed in innovative and attractive ways.
Zoos do this to a less developed extent, with the 'Reptile House' or 'Moonlight World' (nocturnal animals) quite common. But there is no doubt that museums currently surpass zoos in this type of interpretive expertise.
Where zoos surpass museums is in creating major exhibits to capitalise on their collections' individual stars. The trend in zoos is to build larger, more attractive enclosures to house and display fewer animals to better effect.
The budget for London Zoo's forthcoming Western Lowland Gorilla exhibit would buy a gallery makeover for even the most aspirational museum. While it will include interpretive displays and supporting species such as smaller monkeys and birds, the whole point of the exhibit is to display a few gorillas to the best effect.
Where are the parallels for this type of display in museums? Considering the incredible stories and iconic objects in museum collections, there aren't many.
The National Gallery has produced several temporary exhibitions showcasing key objects - but is it a coincidence that this is another organisation with a restricted collection, virtually all on show?
Temporary displays in museums tend to be miniature versions of the themed gallery. While this approach works in many ways, are there implications for how the collections are used and understood? Museum staff know which of their objects are particularly important or fascinating - but does the visitor?
Zoos get bored of telling visitors the success stories - for example, how the Arabian oryx was saved from extinction and reintroduced to the wild through the collective action of zoos. But there are always visitors who haven't heard these stories before, and who might doubt that such things could ever be possible.
Could museum curators be bored too, with their added problem of an embarrassment of riches to display? Or perhaps there is an assumption that some objects are so famous that there is nothing more to be said?
Museums do seem spoilt for choice when it comes to displaying their collections and as a result, perhaps see some display options as too 'obvious'.
An increasingly common aspiration of museums is to make their exhibitions 'relevant' to visitors. Perhaps this influences display choices. Maybe it is a direct response to those accusations of elitism that tend to arise from a surface reading of museums' visitor profiles. But are museums playing to their strengths if they try to focus on relevance?
Zoos are acutely aware of the fascination of people for the 'other', the draw of something 'like us but not like us'. Zoos would lose something if they only aimed for relevance. The big cats or the great apes are star turns when it comes to stirring something that feels positively primeval.
But there is plenty of scope for any animal to make an impression. The biggest crowd in London Zoo recently was huddled around an old pig-pen as a sow gave birth to eight piglets. So presumably there is something in the idea of biophilia, the innate attraction of living things.
But farmers (for whom the display would perhaps be 'relevant') don't seem so impressed by a farrowing pig.
London Zoo aims to explore these issues in depth via a series of visitor research projects. Zoos need to target ever scarcer cash resources and continue to attract visitors in an increasingly competitive market.
There is so much that we don't understand well, but visitors clearly know what they want, and for some of them it is zoos rather than museums. Dissecting that further promises to unlock some valuable new knowledge for all of us. mj
Catherine Halcrow is the head of interpretation at the Zoological Society of London, and ex-Science Museum
For information on the Mori visitor research see Museums Journal November 2004, p15 or www.mla.gov.uk
