Public History and Wellbeing: A Comparative Analysis of the Impact of Digital and In-Person Engagement on Visitors’ Subjective Wellbeing at Elizabeth Gaskell’s House, UK

Abstract

Over the last two decades, there has been an emergence of research pertaining to the impact of in-person engagement with historical sites on visitor wellbeing. Yet, despite this increasingly prolific research into the impact of historic places on individual visitors’ or participants’ wellbeing, the impact of digital online engagement with historical places on user wellbeing has been largely overlooked. This research sought to investigate and compare the impact of digital engagement versus in-person engagement on wellbeing at the heritage site Elizabeth Gaskell’s House (UK). The quantitative and qualitative evaluation is based on public health care accredited measures (PANAS), previously piloted wellbeing measures designed for use in a heritage context (MWS), and visitor/user commentary. These methods enabled this study to begin to determine the differential wellbeing impact when engaging with heritage online or in-person and conclude that digital engagement provides an opportunity for historic places to lessen wellbeing inequality and support wellbeing.