Trajectories of students’ momentary interest in evolution during a museum guided tour

A person’s stable and momentary interest have a positive influence on learning. For understanding global challenges related to e.g. biodiversity loss, interest in and knowledge about evolution is of great importance. Museums can make an important contribution to learning about evolution in terms of interest. So far, there is a lack of studies on how exactly museum visits affect students’ interest. Against this background, the present study investigated to what extent a guided tour of a NHM can arouse the momentary interest of students. Students (N = 251) aged 15–18 were surveyed by questionnaire before and during a museum tour on evolution. One result is that students could be assigned to theoretically describable groups. Students in the responder group showed an increase in momentary interest, while students in the non-responder group showed a low interest level. Students in the high-level responder group showed a relatively high momentary interest level. The results demonstrate that students were most activated when provided a certain level of open-mindedness. Future studies might investigate why visitors’ momentary interest behaves the way we described empirically and how museum guides can respond to students’ interests. This includes identifying cues that trigger trajectories of momentary interest during a museum tour.