Abstract
Cultural institutions frequently use design to help audiences engage with scientific knowledge and understand environmental crises, yet evaluating design’s impact remains challenging. Existing frameworks focus on audience learning, demonstrated through feedback surveys, but such frameworks overlook how designers, scientists, museum staff, visitors and non-humans co-shape engagement and impact. This paper discusses the significance of distributed impact, and tests methods for evaluating how impact is distributed across stakeholders in a museum environment. The case study details a Museum-Lates event using experimental experience design to engage audiences with coral conservation. Using multi-method data collection across different stages of event production, we trace how moments of curiosity, collaborative making and contemplative sensorial encounters emerge and propagate. We propose a metaphorical Seeds of Care framework to conceptualise relational impacts in museum settings. We suggest design and evaluation strategies by mapping how reflections on more-than-human care are carried among stakeholders, supporting engagement with ecological conservation.
Keywords
Relational impact, public engagement, ecological care, design interventions
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1105
Citation
Binyamini Ben Meir, N., Selby, L., Barrios-O’Neill, D., Jarvis, C., and Rungta, D. (2026) Evaluating Impact as a Distributed Ecosystem: Insights from a Coral-Themed Museum Late, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1105
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Evaluating Impact as a Distributed Ecosystem: Insights from a Coral-Themed Museum Late
Cultural institutions frequently use design to help audiences engage with scientific knowledge and understand environmental crises, yet evaluating design’s impact remains challenging. Existing frameworks focus on audience learning, demonstrated through feedback surveys, but such frameworks overlook how designers, scientists, museum staff, visitors and non-humans co-shape engagement and impact. This paper discusses the significance of distributed impact, and tests methods for evaluating how impact is distributed across stakeholders in a museum environment. The case study details a Museum-Lates event using experimental experience design to engage audiences with coral conservation. Using multi-method data collection across different stages of event production, we trace how moments of curiosity, collaborative making and contemplative sensorial encounters emerge and propagate. We propose a metaphorical Seeds of Care framework to conceptualise relational impacts in museum settings. We suggest design and evaluation strategies by mapping how reflections on more-than-human care are carried among stakeholders, supporting engagement with ecological conservation.