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� Main economic activity scale: countries are extremely interested in assessing the
economic impact of culture. Careful recording of economic activity can therefore be
extremely important. Surveys often pay particular attention to craft or home-based
industry and relative economic roles of men and women (e.g. in some societies men
carry out agriculture, but women conduct financial affairs and marketing).
� Income level: the place of shared income, income in kind rather than in coinage, and
relative roles of men and women can be extremely important cultural markers.
Other surveys also consider:
� Race/ethnicity: some European countries place a lot of emphasis on ethnicity, but other
countries do not. In France, ethnicity evokes strong emotions as distracting from overall
French nationality and identity. In Brazil, races are so mixed that few people have a clear
ethnicity. It is likely that many societies will evolve towards the Brazilian model.
� Class/caste: the dimensions of class and caste can be very politically divisive, although
an obvious class divide may be difficult to heal without the evidence of survey data.
� Religious affiliation: this may be seen as a personal or a public issue. A state religion
may over-count believers.
� Arts knowledge/competence: the measurement of skills and competence is a ‘growth
area’ in statistics, but there has been little agreed systematic work in the area of arts and
culture.
Language is often an important independent variable that is included to identify differences in
participation where linguistic differences may interact with the provision and presentation of
cultural goods and services. Language and culture have an important influence on the quality of
response to questionnaires. For example, Asian people may struggle to give a negative
response to a question. Certain items may be taboo in certain households, and people may not
be willing to affirm their presence. Some societies count in, for example, ‘fives’ rather than ‘tens’,
leading to mistakes in reporting possessions (e.g. farm animals). In short, all survey
organizations need to question their most basic assumptions when designing a survey to pick
out cultural differences and practices.
The key statistical indicators considered in participation studies to track levels of engagement in
the arts – whether about society at large or about specific sub-groups, are 6 :
� Participation rate in cultural activities: typically reported as a percentage of the population
(or sub-populations) who participate during a given period.
� Frequency rate in cultural activities: typically reported as average attendance per
attendant (or subject) during a given period.
� Time spent in cultural participation: typically reported as a rate or a quantity of
daily/weekly time dedicated to leisure and cultural activities.
6 These have been put together by identifying congruent and compatible variables from existing data
sources collected by surveys in different countries (see list in Chapter 3.5).
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