"Johnny Showed Us the Butterflies":

Abstract

The museum experience for families is a social one, requiring decision-making, discipline, and many other expressions of a family's typical communication patterns. Although research has focused on ways that families learn about exhibits and museum programs, family members also learn about themselves, each other, and their functioning as a system while in the museum environment. Such interaction raises an application heretofore unexplored: the museum as a family therapy tool. Drawing from the theoretical approaches of structural family therapy, art therapy, and play therapy, this paper describes two areas of potential: manipulation of the museum experience in assigning tasks, and the applicability of museum content to three adjunctive therapy techniques. Possible benefits for different family audiences are suggested, and an agenda for research and development is presented.