  The visit to a science museum may be manifested through complex and dynamic
motivations which, according to the literature, are under-investigated in a
Brazilian context. In the present study, an instrument originally developed by
Delgado in 2008 (http://hdl.handle.net/10773/1623) has been modified and
applied to 202 visitors up to 15 years to the Science Museum "Professor Mario
Tolentino" in Sao Carlos, Brazil, in order to investigate motivation for
visiting the institute. Combined application of Exploratory Factor Analysis and
the Information Bottleneck method revealed that 17 out of the 20 initial items
in the questionnaire aligned with three dimensions of motivation. The main
motivation was learning desire, while entertainment and interaction motivations
were significantly less important. The study provided relevant evidence
regarding the motivations of visitors, and this information will be valuable in
improving the activities of the museum. The implications of our findings for
future research are discussed.
