DisconnectedBodies
Sandbox: master arts audience psychology and engagement
A toolkit of over 150 frameworks that helps you understand how audiences think, act, and engage; designed for cultural organisations seeking deeper participation insights.
The secret of arts audience psychology
Sandbox is our cutting-edge suite of models and frameworks designed to deliver a deep, complete understanding of how arts audiences think and engage.
Supercharge engagement
By breaking down the intricate dynamics of audience behaviour, Sandbox helps cultural organisations shape participation with the most comprehensive profiling and a fresh, audience-focused approach.
The culture sector’s game changer
Born from expert collaborations and thousands of audience interactions, Sandbox is revolutionising engagement strategies; and it’s only available through Disconnected Bodies.
download our Sandbox toolkit information pack
Sandbox is a practical toolkit of over 150 models and frameworks designed to shaped and used at different stages of the engagement journey.
Challenging generic segmentation and profiling
Strategies based on generic segmentation and profiling are discriminatory and fail to capture the nuanced nature of cultural audiences. Grouping audiences solely through demographic data is highly presumptuous; overlooking the diverse psychographics of audiences and perpetuating outdated stereotypes.
Shaping a fairer cultural future
We deliver standout engagement outcomes rooted in Art Council England and National Lottery Heritage Fund strategies; shaping practice and informing the ACE and DCMS 2025 reviews to contribute to the national conversation on cultural access and creative participation.
Sandbox: practical uses
Sandbox is a practical toolkit of over 150 adaptable frameworks and models, designed to be shaped and used at different stages of the Engagement Journey, just like toys in a child’s sandbox.
Identify any kinks in the flow of an existing audience’s journey that’s causing poorer quality engagement, and be proactive in providing new access points, deepening satisfaction and extending impact.
Sandbox provides a structure to guide intuition about new or under-engaged audiences to anticipate sticking points and in turn plan engagement strategies that address these.
As conversation prompts that hone in on the nuance psychology of their engagement, especially useful when they find it difficult to verbalise this engagement; ensuring the complete audience journey is explored and maximum benefit is gained from time spent with audiences.
Appreciate the personal, situational, cultural, institutional and historical factors of audience groups, that may be influencing their willingness to engage.
With a wide range of adaptable frameworks and models to implement and a clearly defined audience engagement journey, research planning becomes a personalised and efficient process. Methodologies become highly relevant to the intended outcome.
Be efficient despite limited resources by designing communication and PR strategies around an audience’s ‘engagement priming’ process of awareness, contextualisation, decision making, preparation and anticipatory meaning making.
When considering new offers Sandbox can be used as the exploration tool to determine an audience’s profile around which future programming can be designed.
Consider not only practical and physical accessibility and inclusion across the complete audience journey, but also psychological accessibility, i.e raising participation confidence.
The sector’s perversion with homogenisation
Too often, cultural research flattens difference by grouping diverse audiences into the same datasets.
This approach dilutes insight and obscures the real impact your work has on specific people and communities.
Arts Council England agrees a change is needed
From the ACE published report Developing Participatory Metrics, ‘measuring people’s engagement with ‘arts and culture’ is fraught with challenges for a number of reasons. In the words of ACE:
The surveys and tools that have traditionally been commissioned by for example Arts Council England to measure cultural engagement, such as those used in this study, are by definition skewed towards the forms of culture that are funded, or are part of the cultural ‘establishment’.
The basis on which cultural engagement is measured does not therefore currently take into account less ‘traditional’ forms of culture, and in particular cultural activity that does not take place in cultural places and spaces.
“We advocate for bespoke methodologies that are shaped by the organisation they serve. This means researchers immersing themselves in your organisational culture, practices and values, and working collaboratively to design research that responds to what is specific, meaningful and unresolved within your context”.
Audience Spectrum is heavily based upon booker behaviour
concentrated on mainstream artforms in established / funded
venues, but even so is the least consistent measure when trying to predict patterns of ‘actual attendance’ at such types of events. It is limited in its usefulness as the data set is too small to be used at anything below local authority level’.
Sandbox for audience research
Sandbox’s value lies in its ability to simplify the complex dynamics of researching arts engagement. Its use allows cultural organisations to better influence engagement behaviour through the use of the most comprehensive engagement methodologies available.
Sandbox for evaluation and reporting
Sandbox has been designed to support funded organisations and projects that require reporting and/or evaluation; helping to secure future funding and build your legacy.
We’re passionate about formalising the impact a piece of work has had on an audience, yet have identified shortfalls in current approaches centred around template surveys and basic questioning that don’t give either the organisation or the audience the consideration they deserve.
2025 Clients and Partners
We’re proud to celebrate 20 years of delivering impactful, growth-driven projects across 15 countries. Our work reflects strong partnerships built on trust, innovation, and shared vision. As we enter our third decade, we remain committed to excellence and meaningful solutions. Thank you to our clients and partners for being part of the journey.
Book A Free 30-minute Video consultation
Book a free 30-minute consultancy call and speak with Disconnected Bodies’ Founder Pablo Colella.
We pride ourselves on offering free, no strings attached advice. Book a day and time that suits you then leave it to us to get you moving past sticking points and towards your goals.