When Going Gets Tough:

Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance
When Going Gets Tough:

Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance

NEA Research Report #59

January 2015
January 2015

National Endowment for the Arts

400 7th Street, SW

Washington, DC 20506

202-682-5400

arts.gov

Published by the NEA Office of Research & Analysis

Sunil Iyengar, Director

Ellen Grantham, Program Analyst

Other staff contributors: Melissa Menzer and Neil Chidester

Prepared by Margaret E. Blume-Kohout and Sara R. Leonard of MBK Analytics with Jennifer L. Novak-Leonard of the 

Cultural Policy Center and NORC, at the University of Chicago

Editorial Assistance by Rebecca Gross

Designed by Kelli Rogowski

Cover Photo: Art lovers visit an exhibition of the artist Don ZanFagna at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art in 

Charleston, South Carolina. Photo courtesy of Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

When going gets tough : barriers and motivations affecting arts attendance.

 pages cm. -- (NEA research report ; #57)

 “Prepared by Margaret E. Blume-Kohout and Sara R. Leonard of MBK Analytics, with Jennifer L. Novak-Leonard of the 

Cultural Policy Center and NORC, at the University of Chicago.”

 Includes bibliographical references.

1. Arts--United States--Citizen participation--Statistics. 2. Arts audiences--United States--Statistics. 3. Arts surveys--

United States. I. Blume-Kohout, Margaret E. II. National Endowment for the Arts. 

 NX230.W49 2015

 700.973’09051--dc23

 2014049647

202-682-5496 Voice/TTY

(a device for individuals who are deaf or hearing-impaired)

Individuals who do not use conventional print materials may contact the Arts Endowment’s Accessibility Office at 

202-682-5532 to obtain this publication in an alternate format.

This publication is available free of charge in print or PDF format at arts.gov, the website of the National Endowment for 

the Arts.
Contents

Preface�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������vii

Summary of Findings .....................................................................................................................................................................................................2

Summary of Implications..............................................................................................................................................................................................4

Chapter I. Introduction��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������5

About the General Social Survey (GSS) ...................................................................................................................................................................5

Historical Backdrop of Arts Attendance Statistics..........................................................................................................................................6

About this Report ............................................................................................................................................................................................................6

Chapter II. Motivations and Barriers��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������9

Snapshot of Arts Attendance Among U.S. Adults...............................................................................................................................................9

Motivations for Arts Attendance................................................................................................................................................................................9

Comparing Motivations for Attendance: Exhibits vs. Performances .....................................................................................................10

Comparing Motivations for Attendance Across Performance Types ....................................................................................................11

Comparing Barriers to Attendance: Exhibits vs. Performances ...............................................................................................................15

Chapter III. Demographic Correlates of Attendance, Motivations, and Barriers ����������������������������������������������������� 17

Socioeconomic Status: Educational Attainment and Income .......................................................................................................................18

Education .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................18

Income ..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................19

Race and Ethnicity .........................................................................................................................................................................................................23

Chapter IV. Engaging with the Arts Across Life Stages �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 29

Sustaining Social Networks through Arts Participation..................................................................................................................................29

The Intersections of Geography, Race/Ethnicity, Motivation, and Co-Attendance .........................................................................29

Young Adults and Family Life...............................................................................................................................................................................31

Parental Education Level and Family Attendance of the Arts ..................................................................................................................33

Parents of School-Aged and Teenage Children ............................................................................................................................................34

The Arts as We Age.......................................................................................................................................................................................................35

Declining Health and Social Isolation...............................................................................................................................................................37
Chapter V. Personal Values and Arts Attendance ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 39

Personal Value Statements .........................................................................................................................................................................................39

Political Party Affiliation .........................................................................................................................................................................................42

Public Expressions of Priorities, Values, and Needs43

Special Focus: Interest in Science, Scientific Occupations, and Arts Attendance .................................................................................44

Implications for Arts Practice ....................................................................................................................................................................................45

Chapter VI. Conclusions ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 47

Implications for Research............................................................................................................................................................................................48

Implications for Policy..................................................................................................................................................................................................49

References ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 51
Tables 

Table II-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, by 

Motivations for Attending the Most Recent Event (2012) .................................................................................................................................10

Table II-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were Interested in, But Did Not Attend, the Visual and/or Performing Arts 

in the Past 12 Months, by Barriers Cited (2012).....................................................................................................................................................15

Figures

Figure I-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended “Benchmark” Arts Activities in the Past 12 Months, by Year and 

Event Type (1982-2012)......................................................................................................................................................................................................7

Figure I-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Event Type (2012) ........................................................................................................................................................................................................12

Figure II-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Most Recent Event Attended and Motivation for Doing So (2012).........................................................................................................12

Figure II-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, by Most Recent 

Event Attended and “Major” Motivations for Doing So (2012).......................................................................................................................13

Figure II-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were Interested in, but Did Not Attend, the Visual and/or Performing 

Arts in the Past 12 Months, by Event They Wanted to Attend (2012)...........................................................................................................14

Figure II-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were Interested in, but Did Not Attend, the Visual and/or Performing 

Arts in the Past 12 Months, by Most Recent Event They Wanted to Attend and Barriers to Not Doing So (2012).................... 15

Figure III-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

or Who Did Not Attend but Expressed Interest in Doing So, by Highest Level of Educational Attainment (2012).................... 18

Figure III-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

and Who Had Free Admission to the Most Recent Event Attended, by Event and by Household Income Quartile (2012).... 20

Figure III-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults, by Whether They Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, Expressed an Interest but did Not Attend, or Otherwise Did Not Attend, by Self-Identified Social Class (2012)...... 21

Figure III-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Reported Socializing with Friends or Family as a Motivation for Their Arts 

Attendance in the Past 12 Months, by Race/Ethnicity (2012)...........................................................................................................................25

Figure III-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Reported Celebrating Cultural Heritage as a Major Reason for Their Arts 

Attendance in the Past 12 Months, by Race/Ethnicity and Immigrant Status (2012)..............................................................................25

Figure III-6. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Age Group and by Events (2012)...........................................................................................................................................................................27

Figure III-7. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Age Group and by Highest Educational Attainment or Current College Enrollment Status (2012)............................................27

Figure IV-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Most Recent Event and by Who (If Anyone) Accompanied Them (2012) .............................................................................................31
Figure IV-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 18 to 34 Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Motivations for Their Most Recent Event Attended, and by Higher-Education Enrollment Status (2012) ............. 32

Figure IV-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 18 to 34 Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in 

the Past 12 Months, by Household Structure and by Event/s (2012)............................................................................................................33

Figure IV-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months and Who Have Children Under Age 6, by Most Recent Events, by “Major” Motivations for Attending, 

and by Whether a Child Accompanied Them (2012)...........................................................................................................................................36

Figure IV-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months and Who Have Children Under Age 6, by Family Co-Attendance at the Most Recent Event, 

and by Highest Educational Attainment (2012).................................................................................................................................................36

Figure IV-6. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 55 and Older Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in 

the Past 12 Months, or Who Expressed Interest in But Did Not Attend, by Frequency of Poor Physical Health (2012)........... 37

Figure V-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who “Agree” or “Strongly Agree” with Value Statements Significant in 

Predicting Arts Attendance, by Whether They Attended or Were Interested in Attending the Visual and/or 

Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months (2012).......................................................................................................................................................40

Figure V-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

or Who Expressed Interest in Attending But Did Not Follow Through, By Political Party Affiliation (2012)..................................42

Figure V-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Hold Scientific Occupations or Science-Related Values, by Whether 

They Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months or Expressed an Interest in Doing So (2012)......... 44
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance vii

Preface

Audience development profits from asking the same basic 

questions that guide a journalistic or police investigation. 

And yet, while arts marketing and outreach efforts have 

long engaged with all “5 Ws,” national surveys have tended 

to focus on two, maybe three.

Who attends the arts is an obvious starting-point. For three 

decades, the NEA’s Survey of Public Participation in the Arts 

(SPPA) has sketched the demographic and socio-economic 

profile of U.S. art-goers. The what is a trickier prospect. 

In 2012, the survey asked about a broader range of arts 

activity than in any past year, but it’s impossible to know 

which artists or organizations were responsible for the 

content enjoyed (or disliked) by the self-reporting attendee. 

Despite this limitation, we have respectable trend data for 

adults’ attendance at several types of events, by art form or 

genre.

Where one goes to experience these live arts activities is 

less documented. But even here the SPPA has made strides 

in collecting valuable information—about both formal and 

informal venues of attendance. Knowledge about when

the attendance occurred is far more restricted—although, 

based on the SPPA design, it would need to have been in 

the past 12 months or (starting in 2012) an event recalled 

from childhood.

This leaves us with why and its distant cousin how. When, in 

the past few cycles of the SPPA, the data showed significant 

declines in attendance for certain art forms, it was natural 

to seek culprits. Did the drop-off in attendance suggest 

widespread apathy for those art forms? To what can we 

attribute reasons for not going—and how many deciding 

factors lay beyond the control of the survey respondent? As 

for the how: to ask whether the event was free of charge, 

and who if anyone accompanied the art-goer, would offer a 

kind of circumstantial evidence—or, so the rationale went—

thus pointing to motives or barriers that otherwise would 

stay hidden.

The 2012 General Social Survey (GSS) gives arts researchers 

a way in. The SPPA’s more inflexible design does not 

permit multiple questions about attitudes or opinions (one 

exception being a series of questions about adults’ musiclistening preferences). The 2012 GSS, however, incorporated 

a NEA module about perceived motivations and barriers in 

live arts attendance. 

The multiple-choice items constructed for these variables 

benefited from a scan of literature about arts participation, 

from research necessarily not derived from the SPPA, as well 

as from the informal feedback of survey methodologists 

and social science researchers. Although arts-related 

questions have surfaced repeatedly throughout the GSS’ 

history, there is no direct precedent for the 2012 items. 

No precedent, that is, among prior GSS questions about 

the arts. (A National Science Foundation module testing 

the public’s appreciation for science offered a kind of 

analogue.)

This report takes the extraordinary blend of demographic, 

socio-economic, and attitudinal variables that compose 

the GSS, and uses it as a backdrop for discussing the NEA 

module findings. The authors hone in on the 13% (roughly 

30 million Americans) who they describe as audiences in 

waiting—people who would have gone to a specific event 

in the last year if not for a barrier they identified. What 

might sway these non-goers? The answers are presented 

here and visualized in Arts Data Profile #4, on the NEA’s 

website.

W.H. Auden wrote, “To ask the hard question is simple.” 

What matters finally is the practical use of this information, 

concerning not only who goes or who doesn’t, and to what 

event or activity, but why they care and how they view their 

choices. This report begins a long process of collective 

learning about such inestimable factors.

Sunil Iyengar

Director, Office of Research & Analysis

National Endowment for the Arts

January 2015
viii National Endowment for the Arts

This page was 

intentionally 

left blank.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance

1

Executive Summary

Over the past two decades, national surveys have 

documented declines in U.S. adults’ attendance across 

various types of visual and performing arts events. This 

downward trend has raised concern and prompted many 

questions about why individuals do or do not choose to 

attend. Until recently, no nationally representative data 

were available to answer these questions.

In 2012, the National Endowment for the Arts sponsored 

a topical module in the General Social Survey (GSS)—a 

highly regarded, nationally-representative biennial survey of 

U.S. adults’ attitudes, perceptions, and opinions on a wide 

variety of social issues—to identify not only why and with 

whom U.S. adults attend the visual and performing arts, but 

also why individuals decide not to attend, after they identify 

an exhibit or performance that interests them.

Using these new data, this report highlights salient findings 

regarding the motivations and barriers that influence U.S. 

adults’ arts attendance, while also taking advantage of the 

wealth of demographic, socioeconomic, and attitudinal 

variables available in the GSS overall to clarify and enrich 

discussions about who attends the visual and performing 

arts.

1

 Importantly, the 2012 GSS enables unprecedented 

insights about interested non-attendees—that is, those 

individuals who express interest in attending exhibits 

or performances, but do not ultimately follow through. 

Throughout the report and its conclusions, we highlight 

similar, different, and unique characteristics of this “missing 

audience.” 

Research on arts participation frequently reports differences 

across observable demographic categories such as age, 

gender, educational attainment, and income. This report 

begins with a similar descriptive breakdown, but then aims 

to integrate an understanding of the changing roles that 

arts-going may play over the course of people’s lives. In 

particular, we observe that attending the arts presents 

individuals with opportunities both to define their own 

sense of identity, and to socialize and deepen bonds with 

others in their families and in their broader communities—

whether they be communities of geography, communities 

of shared cultural heritage, or communities of common 

interests. 1 Arts attendance in the 2012 GSS is captured by the following 

questions: • With the exception of elementary or high school performances, did 

you go to a live music, theater, or dance performance, during the last 12 

months? and • During the last 12 months, did you go to an art exhibit, such as 

paintings, sculpture, textiles, graphic design, or photography?
2 National Endowment for the Arts

Summary of Findings

Over half of U.S. adults (53.6 percent, or 126 million) 

attended at least one art exhibit or live music, theater, or 

dance performance within the past 12 months. 

Another 13.3 percent of U.S. adults (or 31 million) were 

interested in attending at least one exhibit or performance 

in the past 12 months but refrained from doing so.

Socializing with friends or family members was 

the most common motivation for arts attendance.

• This was especially true among those attending 

performances: 76 percent of performance attendees 

mentioned socializing among their reasons for 

attending, and over half of performance attendees were 

accompanied by one or more friends at the most recent 

event they attended.

• In contrast, 88 percent of exhibit-goers said they 

wanted to learn new things. While 68 percent of 

exhibit-goers cited socialization as a motive, only 37 

percent of exhibit attendees were accompanied by 

friends. 

Lack of time was the most commonly reported 

barrier to attending the arts.

• Nearly one in three interested non-attendees—that is, 

adults who expressed interest in attending a specific 

exhibit or performance, but ultimately attended 

neither in the past year—cited lack of time as the most 

important factor in their decision. 

• Parents with young children overwhelmingly cited lack 

of time as their most important reason for choosing 

not to attend exhibits or performances in which they 

had interest. Nearly 60 percent of parents with children 

under age six said this was the most important reason 

for not attending.

• Another one in three interested non-attendees said 

their most important barrier to attending the arts was 

that it cost too much.

• Other significant barriers to attendance included 

finding the exhibit or performance venue too difficult 

to get to (37 percent), and not having anyone to go 

with (22 percent).

However, racial/ethnic minorities and firstgeneration immigrants often emphasized different 

reasons for their decisions to attend or not. For 

example, compared with individuals in other 

racial/ethnic groups:

• Non-Hispanic Blacks and African Americans, and 

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders most frequently 

attended performances to support community events 

and organizations.

• Non-Hispanic Blacks and African Americans less 

frequently mentioned socializing among their reasons 

for attending the arts.

• Among interested non-attendees, Mexican-Americans 

and non-Hispanic Blacks and African Americans more 

often said not having someone to go with prevented 

their attendance. Over 42 percent of interested nonattendees who were Mexican-American and 32 percent 

of interested non-attendees who were non-Hispanic 

Black or African American mentioned the barrier of not 

having someone to go with. Those rates compared with 

only 17 percent of interested non-attendees from other 

racial and ethnic groups.

• Mexican-Americans also were more likely to report 

difficulty getting to the location as a barrier to their 

attendance. About half (47 percent) of interested 

non-attendees of this ethnicity said that difficulty 

getting to the exhibit or performance site prevented 

their attendance, compared with 35 percent of other 

interested non-attendees.

• First-generation Hispanic immigrants often attended 

the arts to celebrate their cultural heritage.

20.2%

25.4%

8.0%

13.3%

33.0

45.6% Attended

Live Performances

33.4% Attended

Art Exhibits

53.6% Attended

At Least One Exhibit or Performance

Within the Past Year

0

20

40

60

80

100

Percent of US Residents Attending One or More Exhibits or Live Arts Performances

Attended Art Exhibits Attended Performances

Attended Both Interested, But Did Not Attend

Percent of U.S. Adults
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 3

More than age alone, life stages—such as the 

pursuit of higher education, marriage, childrearing, and retirement—tend to be predictive of 

people’s decisions to attend and their motives for 

doing so.

• Parents with young children under age six often 

cited socializing with family or friends, learning new 

things, and celebrating cultural heritage as motives for 

attending performances accompanied by their children.

• Empty-nesters and retirees typically are motivated by 

wanting to experience high-quality art, visiting the 

event’s location or venue, supporting community, and 

celebrating cultural heritage.

• Retirees often attend the arts with their spouse or 

partner, and are also more likely to attend alone than 

are younger adults and non-retirees, especially for 

exhibits.

• Retirees’ greatest barrier to attendance is difficulty 

getting to the exhibit or performance location, a 

common complaint among older individuals in poor 

health or with physical disability.

Beyond demographics and life stages, 

socioeconomic status and class identity have 

implications for whether and why adults attend 

the arts.

• Individuals who identified themselves as “upper class” 

were more likely to attend the arts, especially art 

exhibits, but they were less likely than other attendees 

to say they wanted to learn new things as a motivation 

for their attendance.

• Among individuals with very similar household incomes 

and education, those who self-identified as members 

of the middle class were more likely to attend than 

individuals who self-identified as working class.

• Lower-income and working-class adults often said 

they attend the arts to learn new things, or to support 

community events and organizations.

Personal values and attitudes offer new insights 

into who attends the arts.

• Arts attendees more strongly value listening to others’ 

opinions and diverse perspectives, and being creative 

and doing things in original ways, compared with 

non-attendees.

• Arts attendees said, more often than non-attendees, 

that devotion and loyalty to others is important. 

Attendees who hold this value more commonly 

attended performances to socialize with their family 

members and friends.

• In contrast, arts attendees who emphasized wanting 

to experience high-quality art also tended to value 

adventure, excitement, and risk-taking. They were more 

likely to attend with friends or others unrelated to 

them.
4 National Endowment for the Arts

Summary of Implications

Many U.S. arts organizations that serve the public through 

the visual and/or performing arts are grappling today with 

shifting demographics and a rapidly changing participatory 

culture. Some artists and organizations are more easily 

adapting to this new landscape; others are challenged to 

retain and attract new audiences while simultaneously 

upholding an artistic mission.

The arts and the artistic process itself are understandably 

the primary focus of most artists and arts organizations. 

Data suggest, however, that a range of other motivations 

drive the art-going experience of many U.S. adults. This 

report invites discussion about how cultural organizations 

offering art exhibits and live performances can more deeply 

connect with their audiences’ motives for attending.

Interested non-attendees perceive inadequate time as a key 

barrier to their attendance, but this report suggests that 

efforts to help people “find time”—in an absolute sense—is 

only part of the solution. Adults have varying amounts of 

leisure time, after all, and they constantly make choices 

about how to spend it. According to the most recent 

findings from the American Time Use Survey released by 

the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics2, some 95 percent of 

Americans ages 15 and older engage in leisure activities 

on a daily basis. These include: TV-watching, exercising, 

and socializing, for an average of five hours each day.3

The question becomes: How might arts organizations and 

presenters better tap into people’s personal values and 

preference sets, to curate activities on which more people 

choose to spend time? This report offers insights that 

reach beyond simple demographic categories, providing 

information about current attendees’ and interested nonattendees’ life stages, priorities, values, communities, and 

how these factors relate to arts attendance.

Another key finding is that much of the apparent 

education- and income-related gap in arts attendance is 

due not to scant interest among lesser-educated or lowerincome adults, but rather to the unique set of barriers these 

groups experience. When these people choose to attend 

the arts, they more often attribute their reasons to a wish 

to support their communities, to celebrate their cultural 

heritage, or to gain knowledge and learn new things. And 

for many adults—especially for non-White racial or ethnic 

groups—not having anyone to go with and being unable to 

get to the venue are more important barriers than the price 

of admission. Recognizing such motivations and barriers 

will help cultural policymakers, funders, and organizations 

find new paths forward, so that all Americans have greater 

opportunity to engage with the arts.

2 http://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.htm (accessed July 23, 

2014).

3 Adults living with a child under age 6, by contrast, averaged less 

than four hours per day engaged in leisure activities, with the difference 

made up by more time spent on childcare and work.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 5

Chapter I. Introduction

About the General Social Survey (GSS)

The General Social Survey (GSS) is a highly regarded source 

of publicly available data concerning adults’ attitudes and 

opinions on a wide variety of timely and important social 

matters. The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) 

at the University of Chicago has conducted the GSS since 

19724, and NORC has fielded the survey biennially since 

1994, with foundational support from the U.S. National 

Science Foundation. The nationally representative survey 

data are widely used by academic and commercial 

researchers, and purports to be “the most frequently 

analyzed source of information in the social sciences,” 

second only to U.S. Census data.5

Each GSS questionnaire includes a core set of questions 

covering respondents’ demographic characteristics, such 

as their household and family structure, education, and 

employment. These items have remained largely consistent 

over time, permitting trend analysis. In addition, before 

each survey is conducted, NORC solicits proposals for 

additional topical modules to collect timely, relevant 

information on U.S. adults’ attitudes and behaviors as 

they relate to current social issues. Previously fielded 

modules have covered topics such as religion, immigration, 

environment, science knowledge and attitudes, 

volunteerism, and more.

The National Endowment for Arts’ (NEA) Survey of Public 

Participation in the Arts (SPPA), meanwhile, has served 

as the preeminent national source of adult data on artsrelated behaviors. Since 1982, the SPPA has been fielded six 

times by the U.S. Census Bureau—most recently in 2012.) 

Although early SPPA instruments featured a few questions 

about attitudes toward art, collection of these variables was 

discontinued in the mid-1990s. To an extent, the GSS has 

helped to fill this knowledge gap. It has included periodic 

modules designed to capture information about artsrelated attitudes and perceptions. Previous arts-and-culture 

modules were fielded in the 1993, 1998, and 2002 GSS. For 

2012, the NEA collaborated with NORC to field the most 

extensive GSS arts-related module to date. 6

4 The GSS was not conducted in 1979, 1981, or 1992.

5 See: http://www.norc.org/research/projects/pages/generalsocial-survey.aspx.

6 In addition to the GSS arts-and-culture modules fielded in 1993, 

1998, 2002, and 2012, several arts-related questions have been asked 

in other GSS survey years. For example, in the context of a module on 

altruism and charitable giving, the 1996 survery inquired about donations 

of time and money to arts organizations. Some arts-related questions 

have repeated in identical or similar form across the years, but many were 

collected in only one year, providing only a snapshot in time rather than 

allowing for trend analysis. See the NEA’s GSS Arts Data Profile page for a 

list of arts-related variables collected in prior GSS survey years.

The 2012 GSS arts module begins by collecting responses 

to two questions that originated with the 2012 SPPA 

instrument:

1. With the exception of elementary or high school 

performances, did you go to a live music, theater, or 

dance performance, during the last 12 months? and,

2. During the last 12 months, did you go to an art exhibit, 

such as paintings, sculpture, textiles, graphic design, or 

photography? 

As in the SPPA, these opening items steer the interview into 

an entirely new series of questions. Yet unlike the SPPA, the 

2012 GSS focuses not on what people attended, but rather 

why they attended.

Many of these questions echo items in a 2004 survey 

fielded by the Urban Institute.7 That survey measured U.S. 

adults’ responses to seven possible “major” or “minor” 

motivations for arts attendance. Motivations studied in that 

survey included: receiving an emotional reward; gaining 

knowledge or learning something new; experiencing highquality art; socializing with friends or family; celebrating 

one’s cultural heritage; supporting a community event; or 

benefiting from low cost of admission (Ostrower, 2005).

In addition to collecting data on the motivations of current 

arts attendees, the 2012 GSS also reached interested nonattendees—in other words, respondents who reported 

that while they did not actually attend any exhibit or live 

performance in the past year, there was at least one exhibit 

or performance they were interested in, or “wanted to 

go to.” The survey then asks those individuals about the 

relevance of several possible reasons to their decision not 

to attend.

Respondents who cited multiple reasons for their nonattendance were also asked which single reason was 

most important in their decision not to attend. These 

unique data, combined with the wealth of detailed “core” 

demographic variables and other informative questions on 

non-arts-specific values, attitudes, and perceptions, provide 

an unprecedented look at the missing audiences for art 

exhibits and performances. 

7 The Urban Institute fielded a national survey on cultural 

participation by telephone during June and July 2004. The random 

sample of 1,231 Americans over the age of 18 represented a 45 percent 

response rate. The 2004 survey expanded upon the 1998 Urban Institute 

survey, Reggae to Rachmaninoff. See Ostrower 2005, 2008 for additional 

information. 
6 National Endowment for the Arts

Historical Backdrop of Arts Attendance Statistics

Over the past two decades, the SPPA has documented 

declines in arts attendance among U.S. adults. The 

NEA’s consistent measure of attendance across seven 

“benchmark” arts activities—ballet, opera, musical plays, 

nonmusical plays, classical music, jazz, and visiting 

museums or galleries—has shown that only 33.4 percent 

of the U.S. adult population attended any of these in 2012, 

compared with 41 percent in 1992 (NEA, 2013). Figure I-1 

depicts this trend.

Among the benchmark arts activities, jazz, classical music, 

opera, and ballet all saw significant declines in 2008. 

Attendance at non-musical plays and art museums and 

galleries decreased significantly in both 2008 and 2012, 

while attendance at musical plays did so only in 2012. 

Despite a small observed increase in jazz attendance 

between 2008 and 2012, the change was not statistically 

significant.

Consistent with these findings from the SPPA, the GSS also 

shows a decline in the share of U.S. adults who visited art 

museums from 1993 to 2012, from a high of 40.8 percent 

in 1993 to around 37 percent in 1998 and 2002, and 

finally 32.5 percent in 2012.8 The GSS has not consistently 

measured performing arts attendance, preventing similar 

trend comparisons for those activities.

Still, this overall decline across the NEA’s seven “benchmark” 

arts types does not fully capture the changing attendance 

rates for arts and cultural activities. Over the past two 

decades, the SPPA has also documented declines in 

attendance at crafts fairs or visual arts festivals and touring 

parks, monuments, or neighborhoods for their historic or 

design value (NEA, 2013; Novak-Leonard & Brown, 2011). 

Likewise, attendance at dance performances other than 

ballet have declined since 2002 (NEA, 2013). Of the SPPA’s 

multiple measures of attendance, only attendance at Latin, 

Spanish or salsa music performances and attendance at 

outdoor performing arts festivals held steady between 2008 

and 2012, the two years in which these questions first were 

asked (NEA, 2013).

Declining benchmark arts attendance has been at the core 

of continuing discussions and efforts aimed at improving 

attendance. This emphasis has fueled research studies 

attempting to further illuminate attendance patterns, often 

through examination of socio-demographic factors. To date, 

however, limited data have been collected to address why

people do and do not attend.

8 Over many survey years, the GSS’ core questionnaire has 

included a specific question regarding visits to art museums. In 2012, 

this question was asked in addition to the NEA’s Arts Module question 

concerning visits to any art exhibits, including exhibits in museums 

and galleries and in other settings. The question we reference here for 

discussing trends over time is, “How many times did you visit an art 

museum during the last year?”

About this Report

This report highlights salient findings from the 2012 GSS 

regarding motivations and barriers that influence U.S. 

adults’ attendance at art exhibits and live performances. 

The study also avails of other GSS variables, to clarify and 

enrich consideration of arts attendance patterns. Although 

the report does draw on data from multiple GSS survey 

years, its primary focus is on data collected in the most 

recent wave, 2012. 

The breadth of subjects covered in the full GSS, as well 

as its repeated panel interviews of respondents across 

survey years,9 allow us to examine a diverse set of 

personal and social factors in relation to arts attendance. 

The survey allows a similarly detailed look at people 

who have expressed an interest in attending an exhibit 

or performance, but who have not followed through, 

reminding us that people who have not recently attended 

the arts may exhibit different behavioral, attitudinal, and 

demographic characteristics, compared both with current 

audiences and also with other, uninterested non-attendees. 

Throughout the report and its conclusions, we highlight 

similar, different, and unique properties across segments 

of this missing audience. Due to a lack of data about this 

cohort, it has been largely ignored by empirical studies of 

arts attendance.

Chapter II begins with a broad view of arts attendance 

among U.S. adults, comparing topline statistics from the 

2012 GSS with results from the 2012 SPPA. The chapter 

then introduces common motivations for arts attendance, 

and presents the frequencies with which each is cited as 

important. Next, we examine differences in motivations by 

event type—that is, motivations for people who attended 

art exhibits versus live performing arts. Motivations for 

performance attendees are then broken down further, by 

performing arts type: music, dance, or theater. Finally, the 

chapter concludes with a discussion of the barriers that 

interested non-attendees reported, and differences in the 

relative importance of each of these potential barriers for 

adults who wanted to attend an exhibit, versus those who 

wanted to attend a performance.

Having presented key terms and overall motivations for 

(and barriers to) arts attendance, Chapter III turns to 

examine the relative importance of these variables across 

demographic groups. Education, income, age, race and 

ethnicity, and geography are all considered here. Moreover, 

in addition to the descriptive statistics we present for each 

of these factors individually, the chapter highlights these 

factors’ interrelatedness—or how many of them mediate 

the supposed effect of other factors on attendance.

9 Individuals who received the NEA’s Arts Module questions in 

2012 originally entered the GSS sample in 2008 or 2010, which permits 

additional analyses incorporating data collected only in those earlier 

survey waves. 
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 7

Figure I-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended “Benchmark” Arts Activities in the Past 12 

Months, by Year and Event Type (1982-2012)

0

10

20

30

1982 1992 2002 2012

Year

Art Museums/Galleries

Musical Plays

Non-Musical Plays

Classical Music Concerts

Jazz Concerts

Ballet

Opera

Source: Survey of Public Participation in the Arts data, reported in Novak-Leonard and Brown (2011),

and NEA (2014)

Percent SPPA Benchmark Arts Trends

Chapter IV digs deeper into the social circumstances 

influencing arts attendance, directing our focus beyond an 

individual’s innate demographics to consider how family, 

social ties, and age-correlated life stages both motivate 

and deter arts attendance. This chapter discusses how 

arts attendance is affected by the groups with whom 

people socialize and by their social, familial, and other life 

circumstances. 

Each of these dimensions can substantially influence 

individuals’ decisions to attend, as well as their motivations 

for doing so. Our discussion begins with a general 

overview of co-attendance: with whom do people choose 

to attend the arts? Next, we explore how major life 

stages and transitions such as pursuing higher education, 

marriage, raising children followed by an “empty nest,” 

retirement, and finally declines in physical health alter 

U.S. adults’ arts attendance patterns, including not only 

whether they attend the arts, but also why they attend, and 

with whom.

Chapter V begins with the assumption that demographic 

characteristics, socioeconomic status and social ties, and 

life stages may be useful predictors of attendance, but that 

even taken together, these factors prove insufficient to 

explain the significant remaining variation in attendance 

and the motivations and barriers affecting it. 

This chapter examines, therefore, the personal values, 

attitudes, perceptions, and priorities of attendees 

and interested non-attendees, including more public 

expressions of values such as political party affiliation and 

public spending priorities. Taken together with familiar 

demographic variables, these values enable us to identify 

key audience segments, and to suggest strategies for 

arts organizations that seek to build and sustain their 

audience base. The chapter concludes with a special focus 

on attendees who work in scientific occupations, and more 

broadly adults who are interested in or who value scientific 

research endeavors.

Finally, Chapter VI concludes with a summary of 

key inferences one can make based on the analyses 

presented throughout this report. It discusses the report’s 

implications for arts and cultural organizations, for 

researchers, and for cultural policy.

Throughout this report, we provide comparisons of arts 

attendance, motivations and barriers across different 

groups of U.S. adults. Unless otherwise stated, any 

differences we highlight in the text are statistically 

significant at p<.10, meaning there is less than a 10 

percent chance the difference we reported is simply due 

to random variation in the sample, based on Chi-square 

statistical tests of the descriptive cross-tabulations. In 

the later chapters, we also present results from several 

multivariate logistic regression models, which allow us to 

evaluate the significance of specific characteristics while 

taking into account how they relate to others. Additional 

information about the survey questions and links to access 

raw data are provided on the accompanying Arts Data 

Profile page, on the NEA website.
8 National Endowment for the Arts

This page was 

intentionally 

left blank.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 9

Chapter II. Motivations and Barriers

Overall declines in U.S. arts attendance have been welldocumented, but advancing the conversation requires data 

not only on the activities that attendees enjoy, but also on 

what motivates them to continue attending. Reversing this 

apparent decline and encouraging greater arts participation 

requires an understanding of additional factors that prevent 

or hinder participation, so that cultural organizations, 

funders, and policymakers might work productively to 

address or accommodate these changing circumstances.

Over half of the U.S. adult population attended at least one 

art exhibit or live performance in the past year. Among those 

who did attend, about half attended both of these types of 

events. But why did they go? Certainly many individuals are 

motivated by the value they place on experiencing visual 

artworks or performances. At the same time, the 2012 GSS 

shows that many arts attendees are also filling other needs 

and reflecting values beyond intrinsic enjoyment of the arts.

Key Findings

• Socializing with friends and family members is the most 

common motivation for arts attendance 

• Exhibit-goers are most often motivated by a desire to learn 

new things

• About one in seven U.S. adults expressed interest in, but 

did not attend, an exhibit or performance

• Common barriers to attendance included lack of time, high 

cost, and difficulty getting to the location

• About one in five interested non-attendees said they did 

not attend because they had no one to go with

• Among interested non-attendees, only 38 percent cited 

high cost among barriers to attendance—but for the 

majority of those who did, it was the most important 

barrier

Snapshot of Arts Attendance Among 

U.S. Adults

As of 2012, GSS data indicate that over half of U.S. adults 

(53.6 percent) had attended at least one art exhibit or one 

live performing arts event within the past year. This GSS 

estimate is consistent with the contemporaneous 2012 

Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, which similarly 

found that roughly 49 percent of U.S. adults had attended 

the visual or performing arts over the same period (NEA, 

2013).10

This topline statistic includes attendance at any of a wide 

variety of arts events. As shown in Figure II-1, GSS data 

indicate that the majority of arts attendees—representing 

45.6 percent of U.S. adults—went to at least one live music, 

theater, or dance performance. In addition, over half of 

attendees—about one-third (33.4 percent) of adults—

attended at least one art exhibit in the past year. Finally, one 

in four adults (25.4 percent) attended both one or more art 

exhibits and one or more live performances. 

Motivations for Arts Attendance

Starting with a clear picture of arts attendance rates and 

trends is important, largely because it sets the stage 

for more in-depth exploration of the characteristics 

of individuals who do and do not attend, and more 

importantly the reasons for either decision. In the 2012 

GSS, respondents who reported attending at least one live 

performance or exhibit during the prior 12 months were 

asked what motivated their most recent attendance.

Specifically, attendees were asked whether (and to what 

extent) eight possible motivations spurred them to attend: 

socializing with friends and family; visiting a specific 

location or venue; learning “something new”; experiencing 

high-quality art; supporting community events; seeing a 

specific performer or works by a specific individual artist; 

low cost; and learning about or celebrating their family’s 

cultural heritage. 

Table II-1 ranks each of the measured motivations. 

Socializing with family and friends emerged as the most 

common motivation for attending the arts. Roughly three 

out of four adult attendees cited this reason, consistent 

with findings from a 2004 national study (Ostrower, 2005, 

2008).

10 This aggregate measure of visual and/or performing arts 

attendance—as captured by the SPPA—includes, in addition to the seven 

“benchmark” activity types showin in Figure I-1: visiting a park, monument, 

building, or neighborhood for historic or design purposes; attending 

a visual arts or crafts fair, an outdoor performing arts festival; and/or 

attending performances of Latin, Spanish or salsa music and dance other 

than ballet.
10 National Endowment for the Arts

Table II-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who 

Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts 

in the Past 12 Months, by Motivations for 

Attending the Most Recent Event (2012)

Socializing with family or friends 72.9%

Seeing an exhibit or performance at this 

particular location 65.8%

Gaining knowledge or learning something 

new

64.1%

Experiencing high-quality art 63.2%

Supporting a community organization or 

community event 51.2%

Seeing a specific individual artist’s 

performance or artworks 41.2%

Low cost or free admission 40.9%

Celebrating or learning about one’s own 

cultural heritage 24.2%

After socializing, the next most common motivations for arts 

attendance were wanting to (a) see an exhibit or performance 

in a specific location or venue (65.8 percent), (b) learn new 

things (64.1 percent), and (c) experience high-quality art (63.2 

percent). 

About half (51.2 percent) of adults who attended the arts 

report having done so to support community organizations 

or events sponsored by community members. Only two in 

five mentioned low cost of admission or wanting to see a 

performance or artwork by a specific individual. Finally, among 

the structured responses, wanting to learn about or celebrate 

one’s cultural heritage was the least commonly cited, with 

only one-quarter (24.2 percent) of attendees naming this 

motivation for their most recent arts attendance.

For each of these possible motivations, art-goers were asked 

whether it was a “major” or a “minor” reason for attendance. 

Among those who mentioned low cost or celebrating cultural 

heritage among reasons for attendance, fewer than half (45-46 

percent) said these were major reasons for attending. Similarly, 

although visiting the specific venue or location was commonly 

mentioned among individuals’ motivations for attending, for 

many individuals this was only a minor attraction. Only half of 

those who mentioned the location among their motivations 

said visiting it was a major reason for their attendance.

In contrast, when attendees mentioned wanting to socialize, 

to learn, or to experience high-quality art, these motivations 

tended to be more important, with 60 percent or more of 

those respondents naming them as major reasons. Likewise, 

when respondents mentioned seeing a specific individual 

performer or artwork by a specific artist, this motivation was 

much more often labeled a major reason.

Comparing Motivations for Attendance: Exhibits vs. 

Performances

Significant differences emerged among the motivations 

offered by individuals for attending art exhibits versus 

performances. Indeed, except for low cost, which appears 

equally to spur attendance at exhibits and performances 

alike, for all other motivations we see statistically significant 

differences in the frequency that each is cited by exhibit 

attendees, compared with live performance attendees. 

Figure II-2 shows these differences, with the motivations 

arranged from left to right based on their relative and 

absolute frequency of mention among exhibit attendees 

versus performance attendees. 

For adults attending art exhibits, wanting to gain 

knowledge or learn new things was the most dominant 

motivation, mentioned by 88 percent. In stark contrast, 

fewer than half (48 percent) of performance attendees 

shared this motivation. Experiencing high-quality art, 

visiting a specific location, supporting community, and 

celebrating cultural heritage were much more commonly 

mentioned by exhibit attendees than by performance 

attendees.

Performance attendees were substantially more likely to 

be motivated by seeing a specific individual performer, 

whereas exhibit attendees very rarely attended to see 

artworks by a specific individual artist. Roughly two-thirds 

(65 percent) of performance attendees mentioned this 

motivation, and among those individuals, over threequarters (77 percent) said it was a major reason for going. 

In contrast, only six percent of those attending art exhibits 

did so to see artworks by a specific individual artist.

Performance attendees also more frequently mentioned 

socializing with friends or family among their reasons 

for attendance (76 percent versus 68 percent of those 

attending exhibits). Among arts attendees who mentioned 

socializing as a motivation, however, there was no 

significant difference between those attending exhibits 

versus performances in the share (67 percent) who deemed 

socializing as a major reason for attending. 

The pattern of differences in motivations for attending 

exhibits versus performances—including both “major” 

and “minor” reasons—are similar to those found when 

considering only the motivations attendees termed major. 

Yet there were no significant differences by event type in 

the shares of attendees reporting community or cultural 

heritage among their major reasons for attending.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 11

Comparing Motivations for Attendance Across 

Performance Types

Differences in motivation are apparent not only for visual 

versus performing arts attendees, but also across different 

performing art types. If a GSS respondent reported 

attending the performing arts, then he or she was asked 

whether the most recent event he or she attended 

was dance, live music, or theater. Figure II-3 highlights 

significant differences in the major reasons performing artsgoers identified for their most recent event attended.

Respondents who attended theater productions were 

significantly more likely than those who attended dance 

performances or concerts to say their attendance was 

motivated by a desire to experience high-quality art or to 

learn new things. 

Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of theater attendees 

mentioned experiencing high-quality art as either a major 

or minor reason for their attendance, compared with 

only 52 percent of those attending live music or dance 

performances. As shown in Figure II-3, almost two in five 

theater-goers likewise identified experiencing high-quality 

art as a major reason for their attendance, significantly 

higher than for dance or music. Theater-goers were also 

significantly less motivated (than were attendees of other 

performing arts event types) by the desire to see a specific 

individual onstage: only half (51 percent) mentioned this 

among their reasons for attendance overall, and it was a 

major reason for only about one-third of attendees.11

Concert-goers were least likely to mention wanting to learn 

new things (42 percent, versus 54-55 percent of dance 

and theater attendees), and only 17 percent of concertgoers said learning new things was a major reason for their 

attendance, compared with over 30 percent of attendees at 

dance and theater productions combined.

11 Multivariate logistic regression results confirm these observed 

differences. In particular, those who attend theater performances report 

the importance of experiencing high-quality art and the importance of 

wanting to learn as major reasons for attendance at significantly higher 

rates (p=≤0.1) than their dance- and concert-going counterparts, and they 

also report attending to see a specific individual perform onstage at a 

significantly lower rate (p=≤0.001).

Instead, three-quarters of concert attendees (78 percent) 

were motivated by the opportunity to see a specific 

individual perform, and 65 percent further said seeing 

a specific individual perform was a major reason for 

attendance.

On the other hand, whereas experiencing a performance 

at a particular location or venue was often mentioned by 

concert- and theater-goers (64 percent of both groups 

mentioned this motivation) as a minor reason for their 

attendance, the performance venue was less often 

mentioned by dance attendees (56 percent). There was 

no significant difference across performing arts types in 

frequency of citing location or venue as a major attraction.

Theater and dance attendees were both significantly 

more likely than concert-goers to attend in support of 

community organizations or events. But, as shown in Figure 

II-3, over one-third (35 percent) of dance attendees also 

identified supporting community as a major reason for their 

attendance, versus less than one-quarter of concert- and 

theater-goers (24 percent, combined).

Finally, dance attendees also appear somewhat more likely 

to mention celebrating cultural heritage (26 percent versus 

21 percent, p=.11), and theater-goers are less likely to 

mention low cost or free admission as a major motivation 

for attending (16 percent versus 22 percent of others, 

combined). There were no significant differences by event 

type with respect to socializing with friends or family.

Why Do the SPPA and GSS Performing Arts Attendance Numbers Look Different?

The 2012 SPPA found that just 37 percent of adults attended a live performing arts event, which is 

notably lower than the 45.6 percent of adults that the GSS indicates attended performing arts events. 

Why? The SPPA asked specifically about the following types of event: outdoor performing arts festivals; 

musical and nonmusical plays; classical music, jazz, or Latin, Spanish, or salsa music; dance of any kind; 

and opera (NEA, 2013). In contrast, the GSS asks more generally whether the individual went to any live 

music, theater, or dance performance, thus allowing for a broader range of performance types (e.g., pop, 

rock, folk, hip-hop) to be captured in their responses. The higher rates of performing arts attendance 

found in the GSS are similar to those collected in data a 2012 SPPA experimental module, which asked 

more broadly about respondents’ attendance at live music performances.
12 National Endowment for the Arts

Figure II-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Most Recent Event Attended and Motivation for Doing So (2012)

88%

48%

73%

57%

72%

62%

56%

48%

27%

22%

42% 40%

68%

76%

6.0%

65%

0

20

40

80

60

100

Learn

new

things

Experience

high-quality

art

Visit the

location

or venue

Support

community

events

Celebrate

cultural

heritage

Benefit from

Low cost

or free

admission

Socialize

with friends

or family

See specific

artist or

performer

Motivations for Arts Attendance, Exhibits versus Performances

Art Exhibit Performance

Percent of Arts Attendees

Figure II-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Event Type (2012)

20.2%

25.4%

8.0%

46.3683

33.4% Attended

Art Exhibits

45.6% Attended

Live Performances

Total Attending: 53.6%

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percent of US Residents Attending One or More Exhibits or Live Arts Performances

Attended Art Exhibits Attended Both

Attended Live Music, Theater, and/or Dance Performances

Percent of U.S. Adults
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 13

Barriers to Arts Attendance

The GSS is distinct from other surveys of arts attendance 

because, after asking respondents whether they attended 

any art exhibit or live performance in the past year, the 

survey then follows up with individuals who did not attend 

either event type, asking:

♦ During the last 12 months, was there a 

performance or exhibit that you wanted to go 

to, but did not?

Overall, about one in seven U.S. adults (13.3 percent of the 

U.S. adult population) were interested non-attendees—

that is, they expressed an interest in attending at least one 

exhibit or performance within the past year, but ultimately 

they chose not to attend. If the respondent said there was 

a performance or exhibit they wanted to attend, but did 

not, he or she was then asked whether the event of interest 

to them was a performance or an exhibit. Some individuals 

indicated they had interest in both a performance and an 

exhibit, neither of which they had attended. In that case—

that is, if they indicated “both,” then the survey randomly 

assigned them to answer either a series of questions 

regarding the most recent exhibit they had wanted to 

attend (but did not), or the most recent performance.

Interested non-attendees were then asked a series of 

questions about why they did not attend, focusing on the 

most recent exhibit or performance they wanted to go to. In 

particular, they were asked to consider whether each of the 

following potential barriers was important in their decision 

not to attend: costs too much, too difficult to get there, 

could not find anyone to go with, could not find the time, 

did not want to go to that location, or the programs or 

events were not of interest. The survey also collected “Other 

Reason” responses. These included illness or disability, work 

schedules, and difficulty finding childcare.

Figure II-4 illustrates which arts activities were of interest to 

those who did not follow through on their desire to attend. 

More than two-thirds (70 percent) expressed interest in 

attending a live music, theater, or dance performance, while 

only about half as many (36 percent) expressed interest in 

attending an exhibit.

Much of what has been written about the barriers to arts 

attendance focuses on theory, as opposed to empirical 

evidence about the factors keeping people away from 

the arts. Researchers have theorized two distinct types of 

barrier to arts attendance: perceptual and practical (Keaney, 

2008; McCarthy & Jinnett, 2001). Perceptual barriers have 

to do with the way that people think about the arts based 

on past experiences and the attitudes and expectations of 

their social and familial circles (McCarthy & Jinnett, 2001; 

McCarthy, Ondaatje, Zakaras, & Brooks, 2004).

Figure II-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, by 

Most Recent Event Attended and “Major” Motivations for Doing So (2012)

31%

17%

32% 32% 34%

38% 35%

24%

28%

41%

54%

34%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Learn

new things

Experience

high-quality art

Support

community events

See a specific

individual perform

Percent of Performance Attendees

Dance Music Theater
14 National Endowment for the Arts

For example, if an individual’s friends do not attend arts 

events, if the individual herself has not previously attended, 

or if she thinks there will not be others like her in the 

audience, then she might experience perceptual barriers to 

attendance. Perceptual barriers can increase the sense of 

risk people feel, thus making prospective attendance less 

attractive. 

Practical barriers—for example, lack of time, money, and 

transportation—are key to prospective audience members’ 

decisions whether or not to attend, but it is reasonable 

to suppose that such barriers come into play only after

an individual overcomes perceptual barriers (McCarthy 

& Jinnett, 2001). Because the 2012 GSS has subdivided 

non-attendees into those who expressed a desire to attend 

a performance or an exhibit and those who expressed 

no interest in attending, one might conjecture that the 

interested non-attendee group has overcome at least some 

perceptual barriers to attendance, making the survey’s 

exploration of practical barriers especially useful. 

Table II-2 ranks the frequencies with which interested 

non-attendees reported specific barriers as reasons for 

not attending. Among the 13.3 percent of the U.S. adult 

population that makes up the interested non-attendee 

group, inability to find the time—including due to work—

was the most common barrier, cited by nearly half (47 

percent) of interested non-attendees. Lack of time was 

followed by the perception that attendance costs too much 

(38 percent) and that the venue would prove too difficult to 

get to (37 percent).

Many individuals reported multiple factors as contributing 

to their non-attendance, so for these individuals, the 

interview followed up with a question asking which was 

their “most important” or primary concern. Among the 47 

percent who identified lack of time as a reason for nonattendance, over two-thirds (68 percent) said it was the 

most important barrier they faced.

Among those who named cost as a barrier to attendance, 

nearly four out of five (78 percent) identified it as the most 

important barrier they faced. Conversely, fewer than half of 

those who said they did not go because it was too difficult 

to get there, or because they could find no one to go with, 

felt it was their most important barrier (43 percent and 

38 percent, respectively). Finally, among those who said 

not wanting to go to the event’s location was a factor in 

deciding not to attend, fewer than one in four (23 percent) 

named the event’s location as the most important reason.

Figure II-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were Interested in, but Did Not Attend, the Visual and/or 

Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, by Event They Wanted to Attend (2012)

30.1%

6.4% 63.4%

Art Exhibit Both

Performance
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 15

Table II-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were 

Interested in, But Did Not Attend, the Visual 

and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, 

by Barriers Cited (2012) 

Could not find the time, including due to work 47.3%

Costs too much 38.3%

Too difficult to get there, including difficulty due 

to physical handicap or illness 36.6%

Could not find anyone to go with 21.6%

Did not want to go to that location 9.0%

Programs or events were not of interest 6.6%

Comparing Barriers to Attendance: Exhibits vs. 

Performances

Just as motivations for attendance vary significantly for 

performances versus exhibits, so do barriers differ by event 

type. Figure II-5 shows the percentages of interested nonattendees who mentioned each barrier with respect to the 

most recent exhibit or performance they wanted to, but 

ultimately did not, attend. Again, the data are presented 

from left to right by relative and absolute dominance of 

each barrier for exhibits versus performances.

Difficulty getting to the venue and finding the time to do 

so posed significantly greater barriers for adults interested 

in attending art exhibits. In contrast, likely reflecting the 

much higher share of exhibits that people attended for free 

(61 percent, versus 22 percent of performances), cost was 

much more often a barrier for those interested in attending 

performances. Interestingly, not having someone to attend 

with was equally a concern for them.

Figure II-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Were Interested in, but Did Not Attend, the Visual and/

or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months, by Most Recent Event They Wanted to Attend and Barriers to 

Not Doing So (2012)

55%

44% 43%

33%

27%

44%

22% 22%

5.6%

11%

5.9% 6.9%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Lack of time,

or work

Too difficult

to get there,

or disability

Cost

too much

Couldn't find

anyone to

go with

Didn't want

to visit that

location

Program

or event

not of interest

Percent of Interested Non-Attendees

Art Exhibit Performance
16 National Endowment for the Arts

However, those interested in attending performances were 

more likely to find the lack of a companion their “most 

important” barrier. This notion that co-attendance is more 

important—possibly even a deal-breaker—for prospective

attendees of the performing arts is also consistent with 

actual attendees’ significantly higher reported motivation 

to attend performances in order to socialize with family and 

friends.12

Despite minor apparent differences in the percentages of 

interested non-attendees, by event type, who mentioned 

that the location or program was undesirable or 

uninteresting, the sample size was small enough that these 

differences in percentages were not statistically significant 

(p>0.1).13

12 Analysis of the American Time Use Survey from 2003-2009 

shows that performing arts attendees are more likely to attend with 

friends than are individuals visiting museums or than individuals going to 

other entertainments or movie theaters. For more information, see Time 

and Money: Using Federal Data to Measure the Value of Performing Arts 

Activities, NEA Research Note #102. April 2011.

13 We assessed statistical significance of the differences in 

frequencies with which (a) reasons for non-attendance (i.e., barriers) 

were cited overall, and (b) each reason was named “most important,” 

respectively. However, we did not evaluate, for each individual barrier, 

whether there exists a significant difference between the frequency of 

naming that barrier among reasons for non-attendance, and the frequency 

with which that same barrier was named “most important.”
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 17

Chapter III. Demographic Correlates of Attendance, Motivations, and 

Barriers

Basic demographic factors such as education, income 

level, race/ethnicity, and age often receive the lion’s 

share of attention, both in research that describes 

arts attendance behavior and in literature exploring 

motivations for arts attendance. Too frequently, however, 

mere demographic segmentation of arts attendees—an 

exercise that should serve as the starting point for a more 

detailed discussion of who does or does not attend—

impedes a more meaningful dialogue. Narratives that 

center on innate, immutable demographic categories or 

socioeconomic circumstances seem to imply that such 

factors alone have the power to dictate how individuals 

relate to the arts. 

On the contrary, a recent analysis of benchmark arts 

attendance data from the 2008 SPPA found that 

demographic variables explained less than 20 percent of 

the variation in arts attendance (Novak-Leonard & Brown, 

2011). This observation suggests that a more complex set 

of factors influences individuals’ arts participation.

With these caveats in mind, we intend this chapter’s 

presentation of differences in arts attendance, 

motivations, and barriers across observable demographic 

characteristics to permit a more nuanced discussion in 

the next two chapters. There, we demonstrate how life 

stages, relationships, and personal values enable better 

understanding current and prospective attendees of the 

visual and performing arts.

The 2012 GSS does support conventional wisdom and 

prior research findings about the relationships between 

arts attendance and some specific demographic factors. 

For example, education and income are widely recognized 

as key positive predictors of adult arts attendance, and we 

begin the chapter with these measures. But as this chapter 

also demonstrates, examining any one demographic 

dimension alone cannot provide a complete story, due to 

the network of relationships each sustain.

Key Findings

• Self-identified social class is a significant predictor of 

attendance, along with education and income

• Individuals who have less than a bachelor’s degree 

are more likely than those with higher educational 

attainment to be interested non-attendees

• Young adults ages 18 to 24 attend the arts at high 

frequency, especially performances

• Lower-income and working-class adults more often 

attend the arts to learn or support community, and 

are more often motivated to attend by a desire to 

experience high-quality art, as compared with adults 

from high-income households

• Non-Hispanic Blacks or African Americans and 

Mexican-Americans often report, as barriers to 

attendance, difficulty getting to the venue/location and 

not having anyone to go with
18 National Endowment for the Arts

Socioeconomic Status: Educational 

Attainment and Income

Education

As shown in Figure III-1, 76 percent of individuals holding 

bachelor’s or higher degrees reported having attended at 

least one art exhibit or performance in the past year, and 45 

percent attended at least one of each. 

By contrast, only 23 percent of individuals with no high 

school diploma or GED certificate attended arts of any type. 

These findings are corroborated by SPPA data, which show 

arts attendance rates increasing alongside educational level 

(Williams & Keen, 2009), and by additional research studies 

finding that, among various socio-demographic factors, 

“education has the strongest and most consistent effect” 

(Oskala, Keaney, Chan, & Bunting, 2009).

Except among those who did not complete high school, 

the share of U.S. adults who attended at least one live 

performance but did not attend any exhibits is fairly 

constant, hovering around 21.5 percent for those with 

at least a high school education. Likewise, we find no 

particular relationship between the share of those who 

attended only art exhibits and their levels of educational 

attainment.

Rather, the effect of educational attainment on arts 

attendance appears manifest in the greater variety of arts 

events attended by highly educated adults—a pattern that 

may indicate these adults’ more “omnivorous” engagement 

patterns.14 Over 45 percent of adults holding bachelor’s 

and higher degrees attended at least one art exhibit and

at least one live music, theater, or dance performance 

within the past 12 months—over 2.5 times greater than the 

attendance rate for both event types among adults with 

only a high school diploma or GED.

At the same time, the lower attendance rates observed 

among less-educated individuals should not be construed 

as simply lack of interest on their part. The grey bars at the 

top of each stack in Figure III-1 demonstrate that much of 

this apparent education-related gap in attendance is due 

to less-educated individuals’ substantially higher rates of 

“interested” non-attendance. For example, among U.S. 

adults who have high school diplomas or GEDs but no 

higher education, 17 percent reported they were interested 

in attending, but ultimately did not attend, an exhibit or 

performance in the past year. In contrast, only eight percent 

of individuals holding bachelor’s and higher degrees 

reported similarly thwarted interest.

14 Peterson and Kern (1996), and subsequent works by Peterson 

and others, describe cultural omnivores as having “breadth of taste,” not 

discriminating in their attendance between “high-brow” or elite fine art 

forms and more popular art forms. Omnivorousness is contrasted with 

voraciousness, where the latter reflects pure frequency of attendance 

(which, though captured by the SPPA, is not captured in the GSS data).

12%

5.8%

5.1%

12%

21%

17%

8.0%

17%

22%

28%

9.3%

14%

24%

45%

7.6%

9.3%

19%

46%

11%

5.8%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Less than

High School

High School

Diploma

Some

College

Bachelor's

Degree

Graduate

Degree

Percent of U.S. Adults

Interested Non-Attendees Attended Both

Attended Art Exhibits Attended Performances

Figure III-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, or Who Did Not Attend but Expressed Interest in Doing So, by Highest Level of Educational 

Attainment (2012)
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 19

Along these lines, consider the 17-percentage-point gap 

between overall arts attendance rates for adults who had 

only some college education and those who completed 

their bachelor’s degrees. For example, 14 percent adults 

with only some college education experienced an interest 

in attending an art exhibit or performance in the last 12 

months, but did not follow through. If these individuals had 

acted on their interests, then the attendance rate for this 

cohort would not differ significantly from the rate for adults 

who had completed their bachelor’s degree programs.

What barriers must be overcome, then, for these individuals 

with relatively lower educational attainment to follow 

through on their interest in arts attendance? Although 

47 percent of interested non-attendees, overall, say the 

problem is time- or work-related, this barrier appears more 

often for interested non-attendees with graduate degrees 

(65 percent), and less often for adults without a high school 

diploma (36 percent). People who do not hold bachelor’s 

degrees are significantly more likely than those with higher 

educational attainment to find the event location or venue 

too difficult to get to. About two in five (40 percent) in 

this less-educated group cite barriers to access including 

difficulties due to physical disability, versus only one in five 

(22 percent) interested non-attendees with bachelor’s or 

higher degrees.

Motivations for attending the arts also differ across 

categories of educational attainment, though not always in 

predictable ways. Individuals with less than a high school 

diploma or GED are far more likely than other attendees 

to report that their attendance was motivated by wanting 

to learn (76 percent vs. 63 percent), wanting to see an 

exhibit or performance in a particular location or venue (79 

percent vs. 65 percent), supporting community (62 percent 

vs. 51 percent), celebrating cultural heritage (47 percent vs. 

23 percent), and low cost of the event (59 percent vs. 40 

percent). 

These responses foreshadow the wide variety of factors, 

beyond income and educational attainment, that influence 

decisions about arts attendance. On the other hand, only 

56 percent of performance attendees with less than high 

school education mentioned socializing with friends or 

family members as a reason for attending, substantially 

lower in comparison to the 76 percent of performance 

attendees citing social motivation overall. Moreover, only 

67 percent of exhibit attendees with less than a bachelor’s 

degree said they were motivated by a desire to experience 

high-quality art, versus 80 percent of exhibit attendees with 

bachelor’s or higher degrees.

By contrast, adults holding bachelor’s and higher degrees 

more often reported that their arts attendance was 

motivated by a desire to experience high-quality art, 

compared with attendees who had less formal education. 

Celebrating cultural heritage—a strong motivator among 

those with less than a high school education—was also 

cited significantly more often by individuals with graduate 

degrees. This higher frequency of cultural heritage as 

a motivation for attendance at the two extremes of the 

educational attainment spectrum is explained in part by the 

relatively high proportions of first-generation immigrants at 

these two extremes in the GSS sample.

Income

Educational attainment and income are both frequently 

used by social science researchers as proxy measures for 

individuals’ socioeconomic status. Human capital literature 

provides both theoretical and empirical evidence for a 

strong causal impact of education on earned wages. 

Since arts attendance and income both generally increase 

with higher levels of education, it is not surprising to find 

that individuals with higher household incomes are more 

likely to have attended the arts in the past year. Recalling 

the 53.6 percent rate for U.S. adult attendance overall, we 

find that only 37 percent of those in the lowest income 

quartile attended an exhibit or performance in the past 

year. 

Attendance rates increase steadily with higher income, to 

a high of 72 percent among individuals in the top income 

quartile. However, this overall trend masks differences in 

the interactions of income and attendance patterns for 

art exhibits versus live performances. Specifically, while 

performance attendance rates do increase strongly with 

income, the trend for art exhibits is less stark.

A closer look at the relative cost of attending exhibits 

versus performances provides some insight into these 

differences. Overall, 38 percent of arts attendees reported 

that their last arts event was free of charge. Still, well over 

half (61 percent) of adults who attended exhibits did so for 

free—paying no admission fee—versus only 22 percent of 

those attending performances. And, as shown in Figure III2, cost of attendance does matter, especially for individuals 

and families facing tighter budget constraints.

Adults in the lowest quartile of household income were 

twice as likely as those in the highest quartile (25 percent 

versus 12.5 percent) to have said that low cost or free 

admission was a major reason for their arts attendance. In 

addition, adults in the lowest income quartile who attended 

the performing arts were more than twice as likely to have 

attended a free performance, compared with adults in the 

top income quartile (35 percent versus 16 percent), and 

lower-income adults were also significantly more likely to 

attend free exhibits.

This price motivation remains salient, even when 

considering only those who attended free exhibits and 

performances. Among those who attended free exhibits or 

performances, only 17 percent of adults in the top income 

quartile indicated that free admission was a major reason 

for attendance. In contrast, across the three lower income 
20 National Endowment for the Arts

quartiles, 29 percent of attendees at free events said that 

low cost was a major reason. 

Other differences in motivations for arts attendance by 

income are, to varying extents, correlated with those found 

for educational attainment, as discussed earlier in this 

chapter. As with adults who hold no high school diploma or 

GED, individuals in the lowest income quartile are notably 

more likely than those in the higher three quartiles to 

mention wanting to learn (76 percent versus 62 percent 

percent), visiting a particular location (74 percent versus 

64 percent), supporting community (62 percent versus 

49 percent), and celebrating cultural heritage (37 percent 

versus 22 percent).

In contrast, income seems to have little if no effect on 

socializing as a motive for attending the arts. Similarly, 

the desire to experience high-quality art is also no more 

common among higher income quartiles, in contrast to 

the trend observed for higher educational levels. The 

lowest quartile is most often motivated by this desire, at 

70 percent, compared with 60 percent of attendees in the 

highest income quartile who mentioned this motivation. 

Individuals in the highest income quartile are also 

significantly less likely to report their attendance as 

motivated by learning about or celebrating their family’s 

cultural heritage; as noted above, they are also less 

motivated by low cost or free attendance than are adults in 

the three lower quartiles.

Across the income distribution, barriers expressed by 

interested non-attendees tend to mirror those expressed 

across the range of educational attainment. Not being 

able to find the time, including due to work conflicts, is 

increasingly mentioned not only as education increases 

but also at higher incomes. Just 31 percent of those in the 

lowest income quartile mention time constraints, compared 

with 53 percent of those in higher income quartiles. 

The opposite trend holds for lack of easy access as an 

attendance barrier: 44 percent of adults in the lowest 

income quartile said the exhibit or performance was 

too difficult to get to, and 24 percent of interested nonattendees in the lowest income quartile named these 

access issues as their most important barrier to attendance. 

In contrast, only 24 percent of those in the highest income 

quartile mentioned this issue, and less than 10 percent said 

it was the greatest barrier they face.

Inability to find someone to go with, while most commonly 

cited by the lowest income quartile (32 percent), is least 

commonly reported by individuals with incomes in the third 

quartile (12 percent), while over one in five (22 percent) 

in the top quartile report this barrier. Not surprisingly, 

individuals in the highest income quartile, like those in 

the most highly educated group, were least likely to cite 

cost as a barrier to attendance. Both cost and lack of time 

were more commonly mentioned by respondents with 

below-median household incomes as compared to those 

with above-median household incomes and those with 

household incomes in the lowest quartile.

Figure III-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, and Who Had Free Admission to the Most Recent Event Attended, by Event and by Household 

Income Quartile (2012)

64%

33%

64%

28%

58%

21%

58%

16%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Lowest 25% 2nd Quartile 3rd Quartile Highest 25%

Percent of Attendees

Art Exhibit Performance
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 21

Self-Identified Class Rank

Sociologists make a distinction between “subjective class 

identity” and “objective class position.” Most Americans 

describe themselves as middle class, even though 

their occupational skills, economic market position, 

opportunities, and general life chances would objectively 

place them either higher or lower on the social class 

hierarchy (Hout, 2008; Jackman & Jackman, 1983).

A recent study of Americans’ subjective and objective 

social class and voting behavior argued that over twothirds of the upper-middle class had a deflated sense of 

their class position, while a third of the working class had 

an inflated perception of theirs (Sosnaud, Brady, & Frenk, 

2013). Clearly, more than economic interest or position 

is at stake in shaping how people understand their social 

positions, make choices, relate to others, and act.

As a complement to the personal and household income 

information collected by the GSS, survey respondents 

were asked to identify the social class to which they 

believed they belonged: lower, working, middle, or upper. 

A subsample of respondents were also asked whether 

they felt they were better or worse off than their parents 

had been at their same age. Most respondents identified 

themselves as either working class (45 percent) or middle 

class (44 percent), with just nine percent identifying as 

lower class and two percent as upper class.

Over 70 percent of individuals identifying as upper class 

were in the highest quartile of household income, and 

held bachelor’s or higher degrees. On the other extreme, 

86 percent of individuals identifying as working or lower 

class had less than a bachelor’s degree, and 62 percent 

had below-median household incomes. Given this strong 

correlation between class identification, income, and 

educational attainment, it makes sense that arts attendance 

rates should increase with social class rank. At the same 

time, as social class rank increases, the share of adults who 

are interested non-attendees shrinks precipitously, with 

fewer than two percent of those identifying as “upper class” 

expressing barriers to attendance (see Figure III-3).

These descriptive findings are consistent with results 

from the 1998 GSS, which revealed that people who selfidentified as lower or working class reported lower levels 

of cultural attendance than respondents who self-identified 

as being upper-class (Wilkinson, Waters, Bygren, & Tarlov, 

2007).

And yet, even after controlling for income and education, 

we find that individuals who self-identify as middle or 

upper class are significantly more likely to attend the arts, 

compared with those who identify as working class.15 For 

example, among individuals whose household income was 

around the national median, approximately 60 percent 

identified as working class and 36 percent as middle class. 

15 This result was obtained via multivariate logistic regression, with 

additional controls for respondent’s gender, presence of children under six 

years of age in the household, and rural residence.

Figure III-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults, by Whether They Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts 

in the Past 12 Months, Expressed an Interest but did Not Attend, or Otherwise Did Not Attend, by SelfIdentified Social Class (2012) 

35%

18%

47%

46%

17%

37%

65%

9.1%

26%

74%

< 2%

25%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Lower Class Working Class Middle Class Upper Class

Percent of U.S. Adults

Arts Attendees Interested Non-Attendees Other Non-Attendees
22 National Endowment for the Arts

Despite having very similar household incomes, only 48 

percent of those identifying as working class attended at 

least one exhibit or performance, compared with 67 percent 

who identified as middle class.

This class distinction in arts attendance is strongly 

tempered by differences in each class’ typical educational 

attainment. Still, higher self-identified social class 

nonetheless remains a significant positive predictor. 

Comparing U.S. adults with near-median household 

incomes and similar educational attainment, we find that 

those who identified as middle class had 14 percentage 

points higher probability of attending an exhibit in the past 

year, versus those who identified as working or lower class.

In addition, individuals who identify as working class but 

who say their standard of living is “much better” than their 

parents’ was at the same age are significantly less likely to 

have attended the arts in the past year. In those cases, they 

had over ten percentage points of lower probability than 

did others of the same income, education level, and selfidentified class.

In contrast, adults who similarly find themselves enjoying a 

much better standard of living than their parents but who 

self-identified as upper class had over 20 percentage points 

higher probability of arts attendance than others with 

the same levels of income, education, and self-identified 

class. This higher topline statistic is mainly driven by these 

individuals’ significantly higher attendance rate for art 

exhibits (59 percent, versus 37 percent among respondents 

who identified as middle or upper class, but who did not 

see themselves as much better off than their parents).

There are several theoretical concepts from the sociological 

literature that may help to explain this finding. Weber 

(1978) identified three components in his theory of 

social stratification: class (economic relationship to the 

marketplace), status (honor or prestige), and party (political 

affiliation or power). Status is particularly important in this 

context because it identifies a non-economic component 

of behavior around which people organize and distinguish 

themselves from others. 

Bourdieu (1979) elaborated on Weber’s insight about 

the importance of status groups and their capacity to 

draw boundaries through activities that confer honor and 

prestige on their own members and exclude others. He 

defined taste cultures as the social processes through which 

people classify themselves by their habits, manners, and 

specialized activities (e.g., attending arts events, especially 

“high art”) and thereby make meaning about the social 

world. 

By displaying a taste or appreciation for art through 

attending arts events, individuals define themselves both 

internally and to others as belonging to a higher social 

class, one based on cultural knowledge and social knowhow (attitudes, preferences, manners, etc.)—which Bourdieu 

termed cultural capital—rather than based on financial 

wealth. DiMaggio (1982, 1987) built on Bourdieu’s work in 

arguing that the shaping of taste cultures in the U.S. was a 

function of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century 

rise of an American upper class, which used the distinction 

between high culture and popular culture to define itself 

and distinguish itself from both working-class and middleclass “mass culture.” 

As with educational attainment and household income, 

there are noticeable and significant variations in 

motivations for arts attendance by self-identified class. 

For example, given the observed higher rate of art 

exhibit attendance among potentially new “upper-class” 

individuals, it is noteworthy that these individuals are 

significantly less likely than middle-, working-, and lowerclass individuals to report that wanting to learn was a major 

motivation for exhibit attendance. This finding echoes 

Bourdieu’s notion of cultural capital: those who identify with 

higher social classes in which adults are presumed already 

to be very knowledgeable about the arts may be less willing 

to say that they attended the arts out of a desire to learn.

The need Bourdieu suggested, for upper-middle-class and 

upper-class individuals to demonstrate a taste for the arts, 

also appears when we consider interested non-attendance. 

Excluding parents of young children (under age six)—over 

two in five individuals who reported they couldn’t find the 

time to attend arts nonetheless reported they spend several 

evenings per month socializing with friends, and one in four 

spent at least one night per month going out to bars. 

Probing more deeply using multivariate logistic regression, 

we find this result is largely driven by responses among 

highly sociable, highly-educated adults who self-identified 

as middle class, among whom 88 percent attended at 

least one exhibit or performance in the past year, and 64 

percent attended both. These findings also raise some 

concern about the possibility of social desirability bias16 in 

some individuals’ responses, namely that individuals who 

self-identify with higher social classes may be more likely 

to claim interest in attending the arts as a marker of their 

good taste, cultural capital, and social identity.

Among working-class and lower-class individuals, arts 

attendance also provides a means to define one’s social 

identity, but perhaps with somewhat different motivations. 

Arts attendees who self-identified as working class were 

significantly more likely than those who identified with 

higher social classes to mention, as motivations for their 

16 Specifically, though the count is sufficiently small to have no 

appreciable impact on our overall estimate of the share of U.S. adults who 

are interested non-attendees, the importance of the time constraint itself 

may be slightly overstated.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 23

attendance, learning about or celebrating their cultural 

heritage and supporting their community. About 15 percent 

of working- and lower-class individuals said celebrating 

cultural heritage was a major reason for their recent arts 

attendance, versus less than eight percent of those who 

identified as middle or upper class. Likewise, 30 percent 

of individuals who self-identified as working or lower class 

said supporting community was a major reason for their 

attendance, versus 25 percent of individuals who identified 

as middle or upper class.

Geography

Geographic setting, including both the region of the country 

where an individual resides and also the urbanicity of one’s 

community, is associated with differences in arts attendance 

rates, motivations, and barriers to attendance. Many of 

these differences are insignificant after controlling for other 

predictors of arts attendance, such as age or educational 

attainment. In addition, geography is correlated with relative 

representation of individuals of different racial and ethnic 

subgroups, which complicates independent discussion 

of either of these factors—that is, geography or race/

ethnicity. Below, we highlight the few significant geographic 

differences we observe based on urbanicity and geographic 

region.

Individuals living in central cities of the nation’s largest 

metropolitan areas significantly differ in their attendance 

patterns and motivations, compared with those residing in 

outlying areas, and especially compared with rural residents. 

These urban dwellers are almost equally as likely to have 

recently attended an exhibit as a performance, and they 

are more likely than other U.S. residents to name wanting 

to learn as a major reason for attending performances. 

In addition, about one in five of these individuals say 

celebrating cultural heritage is a major reason for their 

attendance. This significantly greater emphasis on 

celebrating cultural heritage is explained, in large part, by 

the higher concentration of first-generation immigrants in 

these cities.

In contrast, residents of rural areas are significantly more 

likely than are residents of large U.S. cities to cite supporting 

community as a major motivation for attendance. Among 

rural residents attending arts events, 62 percent mentioned 

supporting community as a motivation, compared with 47 

percent of arts attendees who reside in large cities. Notably, 

among adults motivated by a desire to support community 

in rural areas, about two-thirds reported it as a major 

motivation; about half of those in cities considered it major. 

Across Census divisions—the most detailed regional 

information available in the 2012 GSS—only a few 

significant differences emerged when considering arts 

attendance rates as well as motivations and barriers. 

First, residents of the northern Plains,17 Pacific, and 

New England states attend the arts at higher rates than 

individuals elsewhere in the country. Some 36 percent of 

Plains residents and 40 percent of New England and Pacific 

region residents attended an art exhibit within the past 

12 months, versus 33 percent in the U.S. adult population 

overall. Among Plains residents, this higher rate of exhibit 

attendance may indicate greater availability of free exhibits 

in these states: some 96 percent of Plains residents who 

went to art exhibits attended them for free, versus 68 

percent of Pacific region residents, and 58 percent of art 

exhibit attendees elsewhere. Similarly, just over half (51 

percent) of Plains and Pacific states residents attended a 

live music, theater, or dance performance in the past year, a 

rate matched only in the U.S. Northeast (New England plus 

Middle Atlantic divisions).

Second, residents of the West South Central states—Texas, 

Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana—were more likely than 

others to say celebrating cultural heritage was a reason 

for their arts attendance. Some 40 percent mentioned this 

among their reasons for attendance, and about one in four 

attendees (24 percent) in this region said celebrating cultural 

heritage was a major reason for attendance.

Race and Ethnicity

Racial and ethnic groups in the U.S. differ markedly in their 

rates of arts attendance, reasons for attending, and their 

reported barriers to attendance. But as with each of the 

demographic categories explored thus far, race and ethnicity 

are not reliable predictors of attendance when considered 

alone. Earlier studies have found that much of the difference 

across racial and ethnic groups in arts attendance can 

be explained by differences in these groups’ average 

educational attainment, including formal arts education 

(Borgovani, 2004; DiMaggio & Ostrower, 1990; NovakLeonard et al., 2015). Even among adults with bachelor’s and 

higher degrees, however, the 2012 GSS reveals significant 

differences across racial and ethnic groups.

Overall, Mexican-Americans and non-Hispanic Whites have 

very similar rates of arts attendance across all education 

levels. Non-Hispanic Black or African Americans18 with 

less than a bachelor’s degree have significantly lower 

rates of arts attendance compared with similarly educated 

individuals from other racial and/or ethnic groups. For 

example, 45 percent of Asians and Pacific Islanders19, 

17 The U.S. states referred to as “Plains” states here are those in the 

West North Central Census division: Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, 

Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

18 The General Social Survey refer to African Americans throughout 

the survey instrument as “Blacks,”, and coding for the race variables used 

in this section categorizes these individuals together as “Black or African 

American.” The majority of Black individuals in the sample do identify as 

African American; however, the sample also includes, for example, Black 

adults who identify their place origin as the non-Spanish West Indies.

19 GSS race/ethnic categories that have been coded as Asians or 

Pacific Islanders include: Asian Indian, Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, 

Vietnamese, Other Asian, Native Hawaiian, and Other Pacific Islander.
24 National Endowment for the Arts

46 percent of non-Hispanics Whites, and 49 percent of 

Mexican-Americans with less than a bachelor’s degree 

attended an exhibit or performance within the past year, in 

contrast to 37 percent of Blacks and African Americans. 

Reasons for arts attendance also vary by race and ethnicity. 

Despite socializing with friends and family being the 

most commonly reported motivation for arts attendance 

overall, Figure III-4 shows notable differences by race and 

ethnicity, both in overall frequency of mention, and in the 

overall share of adults who reported socializing as a major 

reason for attendance. In particular, non-Hispanic Blacks 

and African Americans, and Hispanics of non-Mexican 

origins were less likely than respondents from other racial 

or ethnic groups to mention socializing with family and 

friends among their reasons for attendance. On the other 

hand, American Indians, Alaska Natives, and individuals 

identifying two or more races were more likely to mention 

social motivations, with biracial and multiracial adults 

significantly more likely than all other groups to identify 

socializing with family or friends as a major reason for 

attendance.

Wanting to learn is the motivation most commonly 

reported by U.S. adults who attend exhibits. However, 

Mexican-Americans, American Indians and Alaska Natives, 

and biracial or multiracial adults are significantly more 

likely to identify wanting to learn as a major motivation for 

attending exhibits than are non-Hispanic Whites. 

Differences across racial and ethnic groups also 

emerge across two key, but somewhat less commonly 

reported motivating factors: low cost and a desire to 

support community. American Indians, Alaska Natives, 

and adults who identify as biracial or multiracial were 

substantially more likely than other groups to cite low 

cost or free admission as a major motivation for attending 

performances. 

Among all racial/ethnic groups, non-Hispanic Blacks and 

African Americans most often cited supporting community 

as a major motivation for attending performances. 

American Indians and Alaska Natives more often cited 

supporting community as a major motivation for attending 

exhibits, and they were less likely to attend performances 

for that reason.

Overall, U.S. adults were less likely to indicate celebrating 

cultural heritage as a motivation for arts attendance, versus 

any other motivation asked about in the GSS. However, 

the rates at which this motivation is cited vary dramatically 

across race and ethnicity groups, as shown in Figure III-5. 

While only 16 percent of non-Hispanic Whites mentioned 

celebrating cultural heritage as a motivation for attending 

arts events, two-thirds (67 percent) of American Indian/

Alaska Natives did, as well as 51 percent of Asians and 

Pacific Islanders. Interestingly, among first-generation 

Hispanics, celebrating cultural heritage was significantly 

more often a major reason for their arts attendance, 

compared with U.S.-born Hispanics.

The most common barriers for interested non-attendees 

also differed across racial and ethnic minority groups. The 

most significant departures from the barriers impacting the 

interested non-attendee group overall were among Black 

or African American and Mexican-American populations. 

What Motivates First-Generation Immigrants?

Socializing? First-generation immigrants who attend the arts are much less likely to indicate that 

socializing was a major motivation than are attendees overall. First-generation immigrants are also more 

likely than the average arts-goer to attend on their own.

Cultural Heritage and Community? First-generation European immigrants are much more likely than 

U.S.-born, non-Hispanic Whites to include celebrating cultural heritage among reasons for attending 

the arts. First-generation immigrants, regardless of region of origin, join American Indians and Alaska 

Natives and non-Hispanic Blacks and African Americans in being more likely to see supporting 

community as a major motivation for attendance.

For first-generation immigrants, the arts serve as means of nostalgic connection to the customs and 

culture of their former home and of taking pride in their country of origin. This observation is made 

by Fernandez-Kelly (2010), who also suggests that first-generation immigrants might also attend the 

“high” arts as a means of signaling their desire to assimilate into America’s upper classes. Farrell and 

Medvedeva (2010) suggest that immigrants find, by attending museum exhibits, a balance between 

participating in “high” culture and connecting with their heritage.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 25

Figure III-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Reported Socializing with Friends or Family as a 

Motivation for Their Arts Attendance in the Past 12 Months, by Race/Ethnicity (2012)

65% 90%

36% 89%

48% 68%

48% 63%

41% 71%

49% 63%

48% 74%

0 20 40 60 80 100

Percent of Attendees

Biracial or Multiple Races

American Indian or Alaska Native

Asian or Pacific Islander

Hispanic, Other Origin

Hispanic, Mexican Origin

Black or African American,

 Non-Hispanic

White, Non-Hispanic

Major Reason Major or Minor Reason

Figure III-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Reported Celebrating Cultural Heritage as a Major Reason 

for Their Arts Attendance in the Past 12 Months, by Race/Ethnicity and Immigrant Status (2012)

28%

3.9%

25%

37%

18%

42%

23%

11%

23%

17%

4.4%

0 10 20 30 40 50

Percent of Attendees

All Other Races or Ethnicities

Asian or Pacific Islander

Hispanic, Other Origin

Hispanic, Mexican Origin

Black or African American, Non-Hispanic

White, Non-Hispanic

U.S. Citizen by Birth First-Generation Immigrant
26 National Endowment for the Arts

Among adults who did not attend an exhibit despite being 

interested, 60 percent of individuals in these two racial/

ethnic groups mentioned that the exhibit location was too 

difficult to get to, versus only 40 percent of U.S. adults from 

other racial/ethnic groups.

Finally, 34 percent of non-Hispanic Black or African 

Americans and Mexican-Americans indicated that their 

inability to find someone to go with was a barrier to 

attending the arts, twice the rate observed (17 percent) 

among interested non-attendees from other racial or ethnic 

groups. 

Aging Audiences?

The perception that, over time, arts attendees have aged 

more rapidly than the general population has provoked 

periodic concern within the non-profit arts field.20 Upon 

a first look it may seem surprising, then, that the GSS 

shows overall rates of arts attendance are actually highest 

among individuals ages 18 to 24 and 35 to 44. About 

58 percent of both age groups attended at least one 

exhibit or performance within the survey year, and in both 

groups, about one in four attended both an exhibit and a 

performance within the past year. 

However, individuals aged 35 to 44 were much more 

likely to attend art exhibits overall, and much less likely 

to attend only a performance, as compared with adults 

aged 18 to 24. Over one-third (34 percent) of respondents 

ages 35 to 44 had attended an art exhibit in the past 

year, versus 27 percent of respondents ages 18 to 24. But, 

whereas nearly one-third (32 percent) of those aged 18 to 

24 attended only performances, the share of individuals 

attending only performances among those aged 35 to 44 

dropped to less than one in four (23 percent).

These results appear to stand at least partially in contrast 

to the 2008 SPPA finding that those in their 40s and 

50s were more likely to attend benchmark arts activities 

than were younger adults (Williams & Keen, 2009). The 

apparent discrepancy may be due in part to the relatively 

high rates of performance attendance among 18-to-24 

year olds shown. 

As discussed above, the broader categories of event types 

used by the GSS allows for inclusion of popular music 

and other events not captured by the SPPA’s “benchmark” 

arts numbers. Thus, while traditional arts organizations 

may remain concerned about relatively lower rates of 

attendance for their own respective art forms among 

young adults, these findings suggest that young adults 

are, in fact, interested in and attending arts overall.

20 NEA Research Report, How a Nation Engages with Art: 

Highlights from the 2012 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA). 

http://arts.gov/publications/additional-materials-related-to-2012-

sppa#sthash.Z5uXddRZ.dpuf

The importance of socializing with friends and family 

differs across age groups, and is highest among 18- 

to 24-year-olds and 35- to 44-year-olds (78 percent, 

compared with 73 percent of arts attendees as a whole, 

cited this reason for their attendance). In contrast, adults 

aged 65 and older are less likely than younger adults to 

say socializing was among their motives for attendance.

Wanting to learn and to experience high-quality art are 

both significantly more commonly mentioned reasons for 

attendance at the two ends of the age spectrum. Roughly 

80 percent and 77 percent of attending 18- to 24-yearolds cited learning and experiencing high-quality art, 

along with 72 percent and 70 percent, respectively, of 

attending adults ages 65 or older. 

Age-related differences in major reasons for arts 

attendance are further complicated by differing rates 

of attendance for live performances versus exhibits. For 

example, adults aged 25 to 44 are more likely than others 

to attend performances out of a desire to see a specific 

individual perform, but they are also less likely to say that 

seeing artworks by a specific artist is a major motivation 

for attending exhibits.

Adults ages 25 to 34 are also more often motivated to 

attend exhibits that have low cost or free admission, and 

they are relatively less motivated than other age groups by 

the exhibit’s location. In contrast, adults aged 35 and older 

more often attend exhibits to support their community, 

and those 45 to 54 years of age who attend exhibits are 

more strongly motivated by visiting a specific exhibit 

location and learning about or celebrating their cultural 

heritage.

Over 70 percent of interested non-attendees aged 18 

to 64 perceived either high costs in attending or lack 

of time—including due to work commitments—as their 

greatest barriers to attendance. As individuals age, 

however, the location or venue for art appears increasingly 

as a concern, either because the exhibit or performance 

venue is too difficult to get to, or because the location 

itself is not one they wish to visit. About half (52 percent) 

of interested non-attendees aged 45 and older named 

these location-related barriers, while only one in four 

adults (26 percent) aged 18 to 44 did so.

Finally, especially among seniors 65 and older, the lower 

likelihood of attendees’ citing socializing with friends and 

family as a reason for attendance—combined with the 

higher likelihood of interested older non-attendees to 

say they could find no one to go with—suggest that part 

of the reason for relatively lower rates of arts attendance 

among older individuals may be social isolation. The next 

chapter explores this possibility.

Some of the apparent age-related findings are explained 

by differences in education level. In particular, among 

respondents aged 75 and older, only 26 percent hold 
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 27

Figure III-6. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Age Group and by Events (2012)

23%

32%

3.5%

58%

19%

28%

6.6%

54%

25%

23%

9.5%

58%

22%

24%

6.9%

53%

18%

26%

9.6%

18%

27%

10%

55%

16%

20%

7.5%

44%

55%

0

20

40

60

80

100

18 to 24 25 to 34 35 to 44 45 to 54 55 to 64 65 to 74 75 and over

Percent of U.S. Adults

Attended Exhibits Only

Attended Both

Attended Performances Only

Figure III-7. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Age Group and by Highest Educational Attainment or Current College Enrollment Status 

(2012)

91%

72%

41%

71%

54%

46%

79%

48%

72%

44%

77%

43%

80%

43%

79%

33%

0

20

40

60

80

100

18 to 24 25 to 34 35 to 44 45 to 54 55 to 64 65 to 74 75 and over

Percent of U.S. Adults

Less than Bachelor's In College Now Bachelor's Degree or Higher
28 National Endowment for the Arts

bachelor’s or higher degrees, compared with 31 percent 

of those under age 75. Closer examination of attendance 

rates by age and education, as shown in Figure III-7, 

reveals no significant drop-off in attendance among 

adults aged 75 and over who have bachelor’s degrees. 

Although it would be inappropriate to attribute all 

age-related declines in attendance to differences in 

educational attainment per se, factors correlated with both

education and aging—for example, health status, as cited 

in Grossman (1972)—may also play a role in the relatively 

lower attendance rates observed among older versus 

younger groups.

Finally, as Figure III-7 indicates, individuals who are 

currently enrolled in college also have higher arts 

attendance than their “highest educational attainment” 

would suggest. Individuals in this group are in the process 

of transitioning across educational categories, and their 

rate of arts attendance is accordingly higher than those 

for other adults who have not earned bachelor’s degrees, 

but is also still lower than among those who already have 

completed bachelor’s or higher degrees. 

This result reminds us that an individual’s highest 

educational attainment should not be considered 

as a static demographic factor. Both the process of 

transition—enrollment in college or university classes, 

here to the exclusion of work—and the outcome—for 

many, attainment of a two- or four-year college degree, 

entering the workforce, and in some cases establishing an 

independent household for the first time—may influence 

both whether and why people do (or do not) attend the 

arts.

In the next chapter, we will explore a variety of life 

transitions, including being involved in higher education, 

becoming married, and entering into retirement, and how 

they potentially affect patterns of arts attendance.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 29

Chapter IV. Engaging with the Arts Across Life Stages

Considering life stages and circumstances, rather than 

age alone—just like examining personal relationships and 

commitments, rather than individual responses alone—can 

shed new light on the myriad factors affecting attendance. 

This approach also can provide a more nuanced 

understanding of the barriers for subsets of the population 

who would like to attend the arts, but who nevertheless 

refrain from doing so. The impulses and barriers to arts 

attendance for “interested non-attendees” can change 

as they go to college, marry and have children, as their 

children grow older and leave home, and after they retire.

Key Findings

• About half of U.S. adults who attend arts do so in the 

company of friends

• Full-time students aged 18 to 34 are more likely to 

attend the arts than young adults not in school

• Married men are more likely than unmarried men to 

follow through on their interest in attending the arts

• Parents with children under age six are less likely to 

attend, and when they do, reasons for attendance may 

depend on whether the child accompanies them

• Parents of children under age six who hold bachelor’s 

degrees are less likely than less-educated parents to 

have brought their children along to the most recent 

event they attended

• Empty-nesters attend exhibits from a desire to visit the 

specific location or venue, and supporting community 

organizations or events is often a major reason for their 

attendance at performances

• Retirees more frequently report that not having 

someone to go with prevented their attendance

Sustaining Social Networks through 

Arts Participation

As we reported in Chapter II, the most common reason that 

individuals identify for attending the arts is to socialize with 

friends and family. So it is not surprising to find that about 

half of arts attendees were accompanied by one or more 

friends.

Attending arts events with friends is more common for 

performances than exhibits. We find about 51 percent of 

performance-goers, and 37 percent of exhibit attendees, 

were accompanied by friends. Excluding young adults 

aged 18 to 24, and after controlling for marital status and 

the presence of young children in the home, the tendency 

to attend the arts with friends does not appear to vary 

significantly by age, gender, or education level. However, 

having young children at home does significantly decrease 

the odds of attending the arts with friends.

Performing arts attendees are more likely to bring along 

friends and close or extended family members. Overall, 

about 45 percent of performance attendees, versus 

34 percent of exhibit attendees, were accompanied by 

extended family members, or by both family members and 

friends. Approximately one-third of performance-goers (31 

percent) and of exhibit-attendees (38 percent) reported 

attending with only their close family members—that is, 

with their spouse, partner, or child.

Attending the arts on one’s own is relatively uncommon 

overall, but adults aged 25 to 34 and older Americans 

(aged 65 and older) were about twice as likely to attend 

the arts on their own, compared with adults between the 

ages of 35 and 54. This may correlate with these groups’ 

relatively higher rates of exhibit attendance. People who 

go to exhibits are significantly more likely to attend on 

their own (9.7 percent) than those attending performances 

(3.2 percent), and exhibit attendees aged 55 and older are 

also significantly more likely than younger adults to attend 

alone. 

The Intersections of Geography, Race/Ethnicity, 

Motivation, and Co-Attendance

The relationships between geography and motivations 

for arts attendance discussed in Chapter III extend to the 

exploration of co-attendance as well. Overall, residents 

of the largest U.S. cities more often attended exhibits 

with only their close family members: their spouse or 

partner, one or more children, or both. On the other 

hand, rural residents are significantly more likely to 

attend performances with close and extended family 

members. Similarly, rural residents who attend the arts to 

support their community (see Chapter III) are more often 
30 National Endowment for the Arts

accompanied by both family members and friends than are 

city-dwellers. Adult city-dwellers, on the other hand, are 

more likely than residents from other areas to attend with 

just their friends or other unrelated individuals (35 percent, 

versus 29 percent among other U.S. residents), when 

attending the arts to support their communities.21

When their motivation for attendance is to celebrate 

cultural heritage, non-Hispanic Black or African Americans 

and multiracial individuals most often attend the arts 

accompanied by family members as well as their friends. In 

contrast, Hispanics of non-Mexican origin are more likely to 

celebrate cultural heritage by attending the arts with only 

their friends or other unrelated individuals; on the other 

extreme, American Indians and Alaska Natives who attend 

the arts for this purpose are more likely to attend with only 

their close or extended family members.

Life Transitions and Arts Attendance 

among Young Adults, Ages 18 to 34

With whom individuals attend the arts is heavily influenced 

not only by their predominant social networks, but also 

by the priorities and circumstances that arise during life 

transitions and stages, many of which may also affect their 

social networks.

Between the ages of 18 and 34, many young adults go 

through a number of transformative life stages: pursuit of 

higher education, getting married, and starting a family. 

Each of these correspond to changes in arts attendance 

rates, co-attendance patterns, and motivations for (or 

barriers to) attending the arts. Being married or living 

with a cohabitant partner, regardless of one’s age, is also 

associated with different arts attendance patterns overall—

so, for the ensuing discussion, we include all age groups.

In looking at the life transitions central to many peoples’ 

young adulthood experiences, we find that distinctions 

emerge not only in rates of attendance, but also in the 

motivations and barriers that affect individual decisions. 

Study of these dynamics can illumine the factors at play for 

young audiences—a demographic increasingly coveted by 

so many arts organizations.

21 Results from a multinomial logistic regression model, controlling 

for age, race/ethnicity, immigrant status, gender, marital status, presence 

of young children at home, and event type.

Arts Attendance among Higher Education Students

Full-time students pursuing bachelor’s or graduate degrees 

attend the arts at significantly higher rates than their 

peers. Among young adults who are full-time students,22

74 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds and 64 percent of those 

aged 25 to 34 report having attended at least one art 

exhibit or performance within the past year, compared 

with 55 percent of 18-to-24-year-old non-students and 53 

percent of 25-to-34-year-old non-students.

Students pursuing higher education may benefit from 

greater access to lower-cost arts and cultural events. On the 

other hand, these students’ arts attendance patterns may 

also reflect differences in individual tastes or preferences—

preferences that may in turn be correlated with their initial 

decision to pursue higher education.

The motivations that most commonly impact full-time 

students differ from those of their non-student peers. 

Figure IV-2 highlights major differences between students’ 

and non-students’ reasons for arts attendance.

Students are more likely to mention wanting to experience 

high-quality art, and they are more often compelled by 

wanting to celebrate their own cultural heritage. In contrast, 

non-students in this age group are more frequently 

motivated to attend an arts activity because they want to 

support community organizations or events. 

Low-cost or free admission, which was previously noted was 

a strong motivator of adults aged 25 to 34, did not differ in 

frequency of mention for full-time students versus nonstudents. Compared with their non-student peers, however, 

full-time students who were interested in an exhibit or 

performance but ultimately did not attend more often cited 

as barriers the cost and difficulty in getting to the venue.

These findings are similar to results reported from an earlier 

survey of university students in the United Kingdom, which 

found that opportunities for social interaction, reasonable 

price, and perceived entertainment value were critical in 

attracting university students to attend the performing arts 

(Kolb, 1997). Ticket prices were the most frequently cited 

barrier to students’ performing arts attendance. In that 

study, however, it also appeared that income or financial 

constraint was not the limiting factor so much as perceived 

entertainment value.

22 The GSS reports current enrollment in school via the labor force 

status variable WRKSTAT, which also includes codes for working full-time, 

working part-time, temporarily not working, being unemployed or laid 

off, retired, keeping house, or other responses to the question: “Last week 

were you working full- time, part- time, going to school, keeping house, 

or what?” If respondents indicate they were doing more than one of these, 

then interviewers are instructed to “give preference to the smallest code 

number that applies.” The implication of this instruction is, if an adult 

student is enrolled in school part-time but also reports working full- or 

part-time, their response is coded to one of the “working” variables. For 

simplicity, we define current full-time enrollment as adults who already 

hold a high school diploma or GED certificate, and whose response to 

WRKSTAT is coded as “currently in school.”
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 31

Specifically, in the UK study, among students who said they 

did not attend arts due to cost, the price they associated 

with arts attendance was lower than the amount they spent 

on other forms of entertainment. In addition, after price 

of admission, students’ most frequently mentioned reason 

for non-attendance was their belief that the performance 

would be “boring.”

In contrast to the apparent focus on entertainment value 

observed in the UK study, another relatively recent report 

found that, while college students most commonly cite 

socializing as a motivation for arts attendance, many also 

say they seek to be challenged by the arts (Brown, 2007). 

These results are consistent with the 2012 GSS finding that 

U.S. higher-education enrollees emphasize wanting to learn 

and to experience high-quality art.

Young Adults and Family Life

Young adults aged 18 and 34, and who have no cohabitant 

partner, spouse, or children living at home, have higher 

rates of arts attendance than their peers. They are most 

motivated to attend art exhibits and/or performances in 

order to socialize with friends and family; experiencing 

high-quality art is of relatively less importance to these 

individuals. Lower cost is more likely to motivate their 

attendance than it is for their peers with children, perhaps 

due to the latter group’s typically higher household income. 

Still, like adults in their age group who have children at 

home, their attendance at art exhibits is much more likely 

to be driven by a desire to learn.

Spouses and Partners

Overall, men and women attend the arts at almost 

identical rates: 54 percent of men and 53 percent of 

women attended at least one exhibit or live performance.23

Women were, however, more likely than men (14.8 percent, 

versus 11.5 percent) to report that they were interested 

in attending a performance or exhibit, but did not follow 

through. Among married men and women, however, 

notable shifts occur in how individuals approach arts 

attendance.

Men and women who are married, as well as those with 

cohabitant partners, are more likely to attend the arts with 

their spouses or partners, and they are also significantly 

less likely to attend with friends or alone. Men in particular 

more commonly visit art exhibits and attend performances 

with their spouses or partners: the probability of attending 

with a spouse or partner is 23 percentage points higher for 

married men than for married women, and the probability 

of visiting an art exhibit with only a spouse or partner 

(no children, friends, relatives, or others) is 13 percentage 

points higher for married men than for married women.

23 This finding differs from prior SPPA results, which show that 

women attend at higher rates than males at many specific arts events. 

However, the data for the 2012 SPPA experimental question that asks 

generally about “going to live music reveal that 31 percent of males 

attended “live music” and 32 percent of females did (31 percent, overall, 

for U.S. adults). This difference by gender in the SPPA is likewise not 

statistically significant. 

Figure IV-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months, by Most Recent Event and by Who (If Anyone) Accompanied Them (2012)

38%

34%

19%

10%

25%

53%

17%

4%

31%

44%

21%

4%

30%

50%

18%

2%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Art Exhibit Dance Music Theater

Percent of Attendees

Close Family Members Only Relatives and Friends

Friends or Others Unrelated Attended Alone
32 National Endowment for the Arts

In contrast, women are more likely than men to attend 

exhibits or performances with a child or other relative, and 

their probability of attending the arts alone is 2.5 percent 

lower than men’s. Notably, among men aged 35 and older, 

married men are both more likely to attend the arts, and 

less likely to say they were interested in attending but did 

not follow through. Some 56 percent of men ages 35 and 

older with spouses or cohabitant partners attended the 

arts, versus 43 percent of their unmarried male peers. 

On the other hand, over 17 percent of unmarried men ages 

35 and older expressed interest but did not attend the arts 

in the past year, versus only 10.5 percent of their married 

peers. This seems to confirm the conventional wisdom 

that men’s arts attendance is largely due to the positive 

influence of their spouses, though the tendency may apply 

only to men who were interested non-attendees prior to 

marriage. 

A relatively small number of studies have looked specifically 

at marital status and the performing arts.24 In those studies, 

marriage has consistently been associated with lower rates 

of arts attendance (Montgomery & Robinson, 2010). As 

our results above indicate, however, the interaction is more 

complicated once gender is taken into account.

A 2004 study across ten U.S. cities found that unmarried 

women attended 21.4 percent more arts performances than 

unmarried men. And yet, among married respondents, men 

24 Note: see also Peterson, Hull, and Kern (2000), Lewis and 

Seaman (2004), and Book and Globerman (1997)

attended arts events just slightly more than did their female 

counterparts (Montgomery & Robinson, 2010). 

The specific behaviors observed in the 2012 GSS for 

married couples’ co-attendance recall findings from two 

decades ago, based on an analysis of the 1992 SPPA. That 

earlier study found that married men’s attendance at 

dance, musical and non-musical theater, and classical music 

performances were more significantly and reliably predicted 

by their female spouses’ childhood exposure to formal arts 

education, regardless of whether men co-attended with 

their spouses. Female spouses’ educational attainment was 

even more significant than their childhood arts exposure, 

as married women with higher educational attainment 

significantly increased their male spouse’s arts attendance 

(Upright, 2004). 

Similarly, the earlier study showed that married women 

were more likely to visit art museums with their husbands 

if the husband had had early exposure to the arts, and 

married women were also more likely overall to attend 

the arts with their husbands if the husband’s educational 

attainment was higher. However, male spouses having 

higher levels of education had no measurable influence on 

women attending the arts on their own (Upright, 2004).

Figure IV-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 18 to 34 Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts 

in the Past 12 Months, by Motivations for Their Most Recent Event Attended, and by Higher-Education 

Enrollment Status (2012)

78%

63%

29%

46%

39%

20%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Experience

high-quality art

Support

community events

Celebrate

cultural heritage

Percent of Attendees Aged 18 to 34

Currently Enrolled Full-Time All Other Young Adults
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 33

Families with Children

In addition to providing opportunities for spouses and 

partners to socialize and reconnect, arts attendance can 

provide parents with opportunities to spend time with their 

children outside the home. Controlling for gender, marital 

status, educational attainment, and income, we find that 

adults aged 18 to 34 in households with children under age 

six attended the arts at a 13 percent lower rate than did 

young adults from households without young children. In 

addition, nearly 20 percent of adults with children under age 

six were interested in attending performances or exhibits, but 

faced barriers, the most commonly mentioned being lack of 

time. For that matter, nearly 60 percent of adults with children 

under age six (and no older children at home) said an inability 

to find time, including due to work, was the most important 

reason for not attending an arts event of interest to them.

When parents of young children do attend the arts with 

a child, they are more likely to attend art exhibits than 

performances. It seems reasonable to conjecture that in many 

cases art exhibits may be more convenient to families with 

young children, offering a wider range of daytime hours, selfdetermined duration, and the ability to move around or leave 

without disrupting other visitors. 

Overall, the main difference we observe among young adults 

with children under age six versus their same-age peers 

without young children is that they are significantly less likely 

to mention visiting a specific location as a draw in their arts 

attendance. However, when looking at reasons for attendance 

among parents of young children, it is important also to 

consider how motivations may differ depending on whether 

these parents are attending with or without their children. 

When parents of young children attend with their child(ren), 

they are much more likely to cite, as major reasons for 

attending, the ability to socialize with friends and family, 

the desire to learn, the celebration of cultural heritage, 

or the low cost of attending the event. Yet, as Figure 

IV-5 illustrates, when parents of young children attend 

performances without their children, the desires to learn 

and to celebrate cultural heritage are rarely mentioned.

Parental Education Level and Family Attendance of the 

Arts

Recent studies have shown parents with bachelor’s or 

higher degrees are more likely to ensure access to formal 

arts education, to take their children to arts events, and 

to encourage their children’s participation in arts activities 

(Oskala et al., 2009; Rabkin & Hedberg, 2011). These 

patterns suggest that parents with higher levels of education 

might be more likely to attend the arts with their children; 

however, findings from the 2012 GSS (though related only 

to the most recent event attended) seem at odds with these 

earlier results. 

Figure IV-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 18 to 34 Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts 

in the Past 12 Months, by Household Structure and by Event/s (2012)

21%

38%

4%

36

16%

29%

6%

49

19%

14%

7%

60

21%

27%

10%

42

24%

22%

7%

47

0

20

40

60

80

100

No Partner,

No Children

Cohabitant

Partner

Unmarried,

With Children

Married,

No Children

Married,

With Children

Percent of Young Adults

Art Exhibits Only

Both Exhibits and Performances

Performances Only
34 National Endowment for the Arts

Parents whose highest educational attainment is a 

bachelor’s degree and who have children under age six 

have 22 percent lower probability25 of attending the arts 

with their children, compared with their less- and moreeducated peers. With whom are these parents attending 

instead? Although overall the probability of attending with 

one’s spouse or partner does not significantly differ by 

educational attainment, more- and less-educated parents 

are significantly more likely to attend with both their spouse 

or partner and their children. In contrast, parents with only 

a bachelor’s degree appear more likely to attend arts with 

their spouse or partner, but without their children.

Although respondents with less than a bachelor’s degree 

are significantly less likely to attend art exhibits and 

performances overall, these differences in children’s coattendance by parental educational level are sufficiently 

stark to warrant further investigation. We therefore 

estimated a multivariate logistic regression to predict 

having attended the arts with a child, conditional on the 

respondent’s being a parent and having one or more 

children under age six (and no older children) at home. 

Controlling for respondent’s age, gender, marital status, 

and household income, we find that the probability of 

young children’s attending the arts with their parent may 

not significantly differ if the parent attending holds a 

bachelor’s degree, versus less than a bachelor’s degree. Put 

another way, even though parents of young children who 

hold bachelor’s and higher degrees have four times higher 

odds (30 percentage points higher probability) of having 

attended the arts in the past year, parents with bachelor’s 

(but not higher) degrees rarely attend the arts with their 

children—so rarely, in fact, that the probability of these 

parents attending the arts with their child is not significantly 

different from that of less-educated parents.

Finally, consistent with our earlier findings on the role of 

educational attainment in motivating arts attendance, here 

we again find that less-educated respondents—in this 

case, just among parents with children under age six—are 

significantly more likely to cite low cost or free admission 

among reasons for arts attendance. About 63 percent 

of parents with less than a bachelor’s degree mentioned 

this motivation, versus only 37.5 percent of parents with 

bachelor’s and higher degrees.

Also, parents who have only bachelor’s degrees may be less 

likely than parents with either higher or lower educational 

attainment to attend the arts as a means of learning 

about their family and cultural heritage. Only 4.9 percent 

of parents of young children with a bachelor’s (but no 

higher) degree mentioned this reason for arts attendance. 

This finding is consistent with the relatively low rate with 

which only-bachelor’s degree-holders who have young 

children choose to attend with them. It is also consistent 

25 Results obtained from multivariate logistic regression, with 

controls for respondent’s age, gender, marital status, household income, 

and event type.

with the generally low rates with which parents of young 

children cite celebration of cultural heritage as a motivation 

for attendance when their children do not co-attend.

Parents of young children are also significantly more likely 

to cite wanting to learn new things as a major reason for 

arts attendance, provided that they hold either less than 

a bachelor’s degree or hold a graduate degree. Only 12 

percent of parents holding only bachelor’s degrees said 

learning was a major motivation for attendance, versus 47 

percent of those with less than a bachelor’s degree, and 24 

percent of those with graduate degrees. 

Parents of School-Aged and Teenage Children

As children grow older and enter school, family attendance 

patterns shift again. Parents with school-age and teenage 

children are not significantly less likely than adults 

without children at home to attend the arts. Parents of 

preteen children, aged 6 to 12, are equally likely to attend 

exhibits versus performances, compared with respondents 

in households with no children, and their reasons for 

attending do not significantly differ by parental education 

level.

Compared with parents of younger children, parents 

of teenagers are significantly more likely to attend the 

arts with children out of a desire to see high-quality art 

(70 percent versus 55 percent of parents with younger 

children). Among parents of teenagers who attended the 

arts with a child, about four in five exhibit attendees, and 

two in three performance attendees, cited this reason for 

their attendance. Similarly, over half (55 percent) of parents 

of teenagers who attended the arts with a child, versus 

37 percent of parents with younger children, said they 

attended to see a specific performer or artist.

Parents with young children were significantly more likely 

to have taken a child to a dance or theater performance, 

versus a live concert. However, we find almost no significant 

differences in child co-attendance rates by art form among 

parents with older children, with one exception. Teenagers’ 

parents who attended a dance performance were almost 

twice as likely (63 percent versus 37 percent) to attend 

with a child, compared with parents of teenagers attending 

music or theater.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 35

The Arts as We Age

Empty-nesters26 are middle-aged and older people in the 

labor force whose children are no longer living at home. 

Empty-nesters are more likely than other arts attendees to 

cite celebrating cultural heritage as a major motivation for 

their arts attendance.27

In this population, attendance at art exhibits is more 

frequently motivated by wanting to visit a particular venue 

or location, with half (50 percent) naming the location 

a major reason for attendance, compared with only 37 

percent of exhibit-goers at other life stages. 

When attending performances, empty-nesters are 

significantly more likely than other performance attendees 

to attend in support of community organizations or events, 

with 30 percent naming this as a major reason versus 26 

percent of other performing arts attendees. Socializing with 

friends and family is also more often a major reason for 

their attendance (58 percent versus 50 percent for other 

performance-goers). 

Retirees28, like empty-nesters, are significantly more likely 

than other adult attendees to mention experiencing highquality art among major motivations for arts attendance. 

Compared with other adult performance attendees, retirees 

were especially more likely to say experiencing high 

quality art was a major reason for attendance (44 percent 

versus 32 percent). Unlike empty-nesters, retirees were not 

significantly motivated to attend exhibits for that reason.

Retirees also differ from empty-nesters (but not from other 

adults) in that they are no more likely than other attendees 

to mention celebrating cultural heritage or supporting 

community among their reasons for attending. And, 

although wanting to learn is more frequently mentioned 

by retired exhibit attendees (92 percent versus 87 percent 

of other exhibit-goers), this is no more frequently a major 

reason for retirees than for other adult attendees of exhibits 

(about 60 percent for both groups).

26 We define empty-nesters are adults aged 45 and older who 

previously had one or more children living in their household, but who as 

of 2012 no longer have children residing at home. In contrast with retirees, 

these individuals reported their work status in 2012 as employed fulltime, employed part-time, or temporarily unemployed / laid off. About 19 

percent of the 2012 GSS sample are in this group.

27 Multivariate logistic regression result controls for race/ethnicity 

and immigration status, gender, marital status, presence of young children 

in the home, highest educational attainment, current higher education 

enrollment, household income, and urbanicity.

28 Retirees in this sample include as all individuals who explicitly 

responded as of 2012 that their working status is “retired,” and who report 

having ever worked for at least one year. About 16.5 percent of the 2012 

GSS sample are in this group.

In contrast with other arts attendees, retirees were less likely 

to indicate that socializing with friends or family is a major 

motivation for attendance generally (50 percent, versus 

40 percent among other adult attendees). Regarding art 

exhibits in particular, only 35 percent of retired attendees 

mentioned socializing as a major reason for attending, 

versus 46 percent of other exhibit-goers. Similarly, for live 

performances only 45 percent of retired attendees, versus 

53 percent of other performance-goers, named socializing 

as a major reason for attending.

Finally, retirees who attended art exhibits were also less 

likely than other attendees of exhibits to say their going 

was motivated by low cost or free admission (29 percent 

versus 45 percent). Meanwhile, retirees who attended 

performances were less likely to have mentioned the venue 

as a draw (54 percent versus 63 percent).

The most commonly mentioned barriers to arts attendance 

also shift as people transition into empty-nesting and 

retirement. Among interested non-attendees aged 18-

54, cost and lack of time are the greatest barriers to 

attendance. But for individuals 55 and older, and for 

retirees in particular, the greatest barrier to attendance is 

the difficulty of accessing the location. Some 35 percent 

of retirees mentioned this as their most important barrier. 

In addition, the difficulty of finding someone to go with 

becomes an increasingly common concern as interested 

non-attendees age, particularly among retirees who want to 

attend a performance.

Compared with other adults who are married or living 

as married29 with a “steady” cohabitant partner, retirees 

are substantially more likely to attend both exhibits and 

performances in the company of only their spouses or 

partners. Overall, 41 percent of retired attendees who have 

a cohabitant spouse/partner, compared with just 33 percent 

of non-retired attendees who have a cohabitant spouse/

partner, went to exhibits and performances with only their 

spouses or partners.

29 The 2012 GSS survey instrument includes questions both 

on legal marital status, and also on the respondent’s relationship and 

cohabitation status. For the latter question, respondents are asked to 

select one of several options, including “I have a steady partner, and we 

live in the same household,” or, in another version of the instrument, 

“I am living as married and my partner and I together live in the same 

household.”
36 National Endowment for the Arts

Figure IV-4. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 

12 Months and Who Have Children Under Age 6, by Most Recent Events, by “Major” Motivations for 

Attending, and by Whether a Child Accompanied Them (2012)

12%

35%

42%

10%

10%

11%

60%

19%

13%

38%

31%

18%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Less than a

bachelor's degree

Bachelor's degree

only

Graduate degree

Percent of Attendees with Child(ren) Under Age 6

With Child, Not Spouse/Partner With Child & Spouse/Partner

With Spouse/Partner, Not Child With No Close Family Members

Figure IV-5. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 

Months and Who Have Children Under Age 6, by Family Co-Attendance at the Most Recent Event, and 

by Highest Educational Attainment (2012)

44%

58%

43%

68%

27%

53%

11%

46%

9.0%

17%

2.9%

32%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Socialize with friends

or family

Learn new things, for

children, education

Celebrate cultural

heritage

Exhibit Performance Exhibit Performance Exhibit Performance

Percent of Attendees with Child(ren) Under Age 6

Attended without Child(ren) Attended with Child(ren)
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 37

Declining Health and Social Isolation

Physical health and well-being are also significant 

determinants of arts attendance. As Figure IV-7 

demonstrates, among U.S. adults aged 55 and older who 

reported spending less than a week of the past month in 

poor physical health, 58 percent attended at least one art 

exhibit or performance within the past year. In contrast, 

only 46 percent of individuals who spent a week or more 

in poor health, and only 30 percent of those who spent 

the entire previous month in poor health, attended any 

arts events during the previous year.

Not surprisingly, given declining rates of attendance 

among those in poor health, adults who were more 

often in this condition or who identified as disabled were 

significantly more likely than healthier individuals without 

disabilities to have been interested in attending an exhibit 

or performance without following through.

Poor physical health appears to have an impact on arts 

attendance primarily for individuals 45 and older, with 

adults aged 65 and older among the most affected. Over 

half (51.5 percent) of adults who reported being in poor 

physical health, overall, were 55 or older, even though 

these individuals comprise less than 37 percent of the 

sample. Among individuals in poor health, the most 

common barrier to attendance was difficulty getting to the 

venue (52 percent), and over one-third (36 percent) said 

access was their most important barrier. Similarly, difficulty 

getting to the location was a noteworthy barrier among 

disabled individuals of any age who wanted to attend 

exhibits. 

In addition, among interested non-attendees aged 55 and 

older who spent less than a week of the past month in 

poor physical health, only 12.1 percent said their greatest 

barrier to attendance was finding someone to go with. 

But among those in persistent poor health, about 30 

percent said not having anyone to go with was their most 

important barrier. Roughly 30 percent of retirees overall, 

and 38 percent of retirees reporting persistent poor 

health, also live alone.

Consistent with the notion that social isolation is a barrier 

for many older Americans’ arts attendance, 36 percent 

of these particular retirees—those living alone, in poor 

health—said they would have been interested in attending 

the arts, but were unable to attend.

Figure IV-6. Percentage of U.S. Adults Aged 55 and Older Who Attended the Visual and/or Performing 

Arts in the Past 12 Months, or Who Expressed Interest in But Did Not Attend, by Frequency of Poor 

Physical Health (2012)

58%

10%

32

46%

11%

43

30%

23%

47

0

20

40

60

80

100

Less than a week One week, to

less than a month

Persistent

Poor Health

Percent of U.S. Adults Ages 55 and Older

Attendees Interested, But Did Not Attend
38 National Endowment for the Arts

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When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 39

Chapter V. Personal Values and Arts Attendance

Many quantitative studies of arts attendance have 

focused on differences in rates of arts attendance across 

standard demographic characteristics, such as age, race 

and/or ethnicity, educational attainment, and income. 

These statistics are particularly important for examining 

questions related to equity, social justice, and potential 

disparities in access (DiMaggio & Ostrower, 1992). 

However, prior research has also shown that observed 

differences in adults’ attendance rates are often not due 

to fundamental differences arising from the demographic 

factors themselves. Rather, differences in attendance are 

often due to other socio-cultural factors, which may be 

incidentally correlated (but not caused by) immutable 

demographic categories. 

Over three decades ago, published studies concluded 

that matters of “lifestyle, attitudes, and developmental 

experiences [were] both more conceptually useful 

variables with which to understand consumer behavior 

regarding the performing arts, and more empirically 

predictive than socioeconomic variables.” (Andreasen 

& Belk, 1980). Personal values, as expressed in other 

activities, stated interests, and opinions have also been 

found to have greater predictive value than demographic 

variables, specifically for explaining arts attendance (Kotler 

& Scheff, 1997)

Despite this prior literature, to date relatively little 

attention has been paid to how the values and attitudes of 

arts attendees might differ from those of non-attendees. 

This knowledge deficit has occurred partly due to the lack 

of relevant variables in recent waves of the NEA’s Survey 

of Public Participation in the Arts. For arts organizations 

seeking to reverse declines in attendance, therefore, the 

GSS data provides a unique perspective for understanding 

and relating to the “missing audience” of interested 

non-attendees, and also for retaining current attendees 

through better knowledge of their values, motivations, and 

concerns.

Key Findings

• Arts attendees placed greater value than non-attendees 

on listening to others’ opinions and understanding 

diverse perspectives

• Attendees who valued devotion and loyalty as 

important were more likely to attend performances 

to socialize with their family members or friends, 

compared with those attendees who placed less 

importance on these qualities

• Republicans and Democrats are equally likely to have 

attended the arts within the past year

• Interested non-attendees tend to have stronger interest 

in safety, crime reduction, and public welfare programs, 

and are more likely to be independent voters

• Attendees and interested non-attendees both tend to 

have strong interest in public education and funding 

scientific research for its benefits to future generations

Personal Value Statements

Attending the arts with friends and family, and doing so 

within the structures of one’s chosen communities, provides 

a sense of comfort and reassurance. This impression 

of personal security that arises from belonging to a 

community or being “embedded” in one’s social network 

can help to lessen the perceived risks of trying out new 

activities, whether exploring a new art form, attending a 

new type of event, or traveling to a new venue. 

At the same time, to create a sense of “belonging” to a 

community or a social network, people seek those who 

share their interests, values, or experiences (Sander & 

Putnam, 2010). The ways in which individuals perceive 

themselves and the values they hold can, as much as any 

innate demographic factor, influence the communities with 

which they choose to associate. Understanding the selfperceptions of adults who do attend the arts, and of those 

who are interested in the arts but experience barriers that 

inhibit their attendance, can thus provide critical insights.

The 2012 GSS includes a series of broad-ranging valuestatements that assess the extent to which people agree 

with the importance of taking risks, listening to opinions 

different from one’s own, and preserving family and 

religious traditions, among other items. As suggested 

in earlier literature, personal values can help explain 

more about the rates of arts attendance than can sociodemographic variables alone.
40 National Endowment for the Arts

Figure V-1. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who “Agree” or “Strongly Agree” with Value Statements 

Significant in Predicting Arts Attendance, by Whether They Attended or Were Interested in Attending 

the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months (2012)

73% 74%

83%

62%

69%

76%

41% 39%

47% 47%

51%

60%

23%

27% 28%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Devotion

and loyalty

Listening

to others'

perspectives

Variety,

trying new

things

Being creative,

original

Excitement,

adventure,

taking risks

Percent of U.S. Adults

Non-Attendees Interested Non-Attendees Attendees

After controlling for the influence of socio-demographic 

differences,30 some personal values appear to predict higher 

chances of attending, while others predict lower chances of 

attending. Figure V-1 shows the frequency of these values 

among recent attendees, interested non-attendees, and 

other non-attendees. The probability of attending the arts 

is significantly higher among those who:

• say it is important to be loyal to their friends, and to 

devote themselves to people close to them;

• say it is important to listen to people who are different 

from them, and that even when the respondent 

disagrees, he or she wants to understand the other 

person’s perspective;

• enjoy variety and trying new and different things;

• value being creative and doing things in their own 

original way; and

• look for adventures and like to take risks, wanting to 

have an exciting life.

30 The personal value statements highlighted here remained 

statistically significant predictors of arts attendance in multivariate logistic 

regression models controlling for the respondent’s age, gender, marital 

status, presence of children in the home, highest educational attainment 

and whether the individual was currently enrolled in school full-time, 

household income, whether the individual had retired from the workforce, 

political party affiliation, immigrant status, and self-identified social class.

Devotion and loyalty to people close to them is a 

particularly significant predictor of arts attendance 

among both men and women. After controlling for other 

socio-demographic differences (see footnote on prior 

page)—including gender differences in the distribution of 

responses to each value statement—we find the probability 

of attending the arts is 12 percentage points higher among 

individuals who share this value, all else equal, with no 

difference for men versus women. Likewise, the probability 

of attending arts is 8.7 percentage points higher among 

those who value variety and trying many new and different 

things, and 7.8 percentage points higher among those who 

feel it is important to listen to others with differing opinions 

and understand their perspectives, all else equal.

Men and women who value being creative and doing 

things in their own original way are 8.6 percentage points 

more likely to attend the arts, but this value is especially 

predictive of arts attendance among men. Men who attend 

the arts have 15 percentage points higher probability of 

saying they value creativity and originality, as compared 

with uninterested non-attendees who share similar 

sociodemographic characteristics.

Individuals who look for adventure and excitement, and 

like taking risks, are also significantly more likely to attend 

the arts. But again, holding this value is more salient for 

men’s attendance and interest in the arts than for women’s. 

Men who share this value are 12-13 percent more likely 

both to express interest in attending and to follow through 

on attending the arts, compared with men of similar 
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 41

Changing Attitudes Over Time

Between 1993 and 1998, two years in which the GSS asked a set of the same questions, U.S. adults’ 

attitudes toward “excellence” in the arts seemed mixed. On the one hand, people seemed to become 

more open-minded and democratic about who could judge art; by 1998, a significantly smaller 

proportion of adults (42 percent) agreed with the statement, “Only a few people have the knowledge and 

ability to judge excellence in the arts.” Notably, those who had visited an art museum or gallery were 

significantly more likely to agree that only a few people could judge artistic excellence, whereas those 

with at least a college degree were significantly less likely to agree that only a few people could judge 

artistic excellence. On the other hand, nearly all U.S. adults agreed in 1993 that artistic excellence could 

be found in popular and folk arts, in addition to in fine art. At the same time, U.S. adults also seem to 

have increased appreciation for modern visual art over this period.

Self-Reported Statements 1993 1998

“Only a few people have the knowledge and ability to judge excellence in the arts. 49% 42%

“Modern painting is just slapped on: a child could do it.” 41% 31%

“Artistic excellence can be found in popular and folk culture just as much as in the fine 

arts.” 95% n/a

socio-demographic backgrounds who do not share this 

value. By contrast, men who feel it is important to be 

humble, modest, and not draw attention to oneself, are 11 

percentage points less likely to attend the arts—especially 

exhibits—all else equal, whereas those who value success 

and recognition for their achievements are 12 percentage 

points more likely to attend.

Compared with exhibit attendees, performance-goers 

more often said physical safety and security was important 

to them. And, among performance attendees, concertgoers and attendees of dance performances also appear 

somewhat different in the values they espouse. For 

example, concert-goers are significantly more likely than 

other performance attendees to say it is important to them 

to show their abilities, be admired, and achieve success and 

recognition. Male concert-goers also more often emphasize 

the importance of being free and independent.

By contrast, dance attendees were significantly less likely 

to say they valued success and recognition from others for 

their achievements, and theater-goers were significantly 

less likely to say it is important to them to command others’ 

respect, compared (in each case) with other performance 

attendees with similar socio-demographic characteristics.

Instead, male and female performance attendees who 

emphasized having fun, and helping those around them—

caring for their wellbeing—were more likely recently to 

have attended a dance performance. In our fully-specified 

model, including socio-demographic variables and 

value statements, we find that supporting community 

organizations and events is still significantly more common 

as a major reason for dance than for music or theater 

attendance (see Chapter II).

In 1980, a study based on surveys in southern U.S. cities 

found that people who valued “traditionalism” were 

less likely to attend either the theater or the symphony, 

compared with adults who did not espouse such values 

(Andreasen & Belk, 1980). In this study, traditionalism 

was understood as an aversion to taking risks, and as the 

upholding of normative family and gender roles, “churchgoing, old-fashioned tastes, a feeling that things are 

moving too fast, and a wish for the good old days.”

The 2012 GSS similarly asks about the importance 

respondents place on observing family or religious 

traditions and customs; overall, we find no relationship 

between individuals’ valuing tradition and whether or not 

they attended the arts in the past year. Approximately 49 

percent of arts-goers and non-attendees alike reported 

valuing tradition and following family or religious 

customs. Among performance attendees, however, valuing 

family and/or religious traditions or customs was in fact 

significantly more common among theater (60 percent) and 

dance attendees, versus among those attending live music 

performances.31 At the same time, theater attendees are 

more likely than other performing arts-goers to say they 

like variety, and trying new and different things.

31 Arts attendees who say tradition is important or very important 

to them are also significantly more likely to have attended arts to learn 

about or celebrate their own cultural heritage.
42 National Endowment for the Arts

Positive associations between arts-going and valuing 

open-mindedness and/or being original and creative were 

also found two decades ago, in the 1993 GSS. A study 

using these earlier data found that adults who visited 

art museums were more likely to be open-minded and 

have positive attitudes toward people different from 

themselves. 

This earlier data also found that individuals who attended 

art museums prioritized having friends who were cultured, 

creative, and intelligent (DiMaggio, 1996). In the 2012 

GSS, we find that individuals who believe it is important 

to listen to others’ opinions and perspectives have 11 

percentage points higher probability of having attended 

an art exhibit in the past year. Exhibit attendees were 

also less likely than performing arts attendees to say it is 

important to behave properly and avoid doing anything 

people might say is wrong, or to be modest and avoid 

attracting attention.

Political Party Affiliation

In addition to asking adults about personal value 

statements, the GSS also probes for sociopolitical attitudes 

through questions about political party affiliation, support 

for various domains of public expenditure, confidence in 

government agencies and processes, and more. To some 

extent, political party affiliation may summarize value sets 

that individuals already hold. However, a person’s choice 

to identify with one political party or another may in itself 

be meaningful, given decades of documented declines in 

civic engagement (Sander & Putnam, 2010). For example, 

a 2013 Gallup poll reported that 31 percent of Americans 

identified as Democrats, 25 percent as Republicans, and a 

record 42 percent identified as independent.32

Figure V-2 presents for comparison the distributions 

of individuals’ self-identified political party affiliations 

among current arts attendees versus interested nonattendees. Arts attendees span the political spectrum, 

with no statistically significant differences in the shares 

of Democrats and Republicans who reported having 

attended at least one art exhibit or performance in the 

previous year. Roughly 55 percent of Democrats, and 57 

percent of Republicans, attended at least one art exhibit 

or performance.

Overall, individuals who reported identifying with either 

the Democratic or Republican party were significantly 

more likely to attend the arts than their independent 

peers. Among Americans who reported interest in 

attending the arts but who experienced barriers to 

their attendance, 40 percent identified as Democrats, 

20 percent identified as Republicans, and 38 percent 

identified as Independent (see Figure V-2). It appears that 

individuals who identify more strongly with the Republican 

party are more likely to have followed through on any 

interest in attending the arts, with over 25 percent of arts 

attendees indicating Republican party affiliation versus 

just 20 percent of interested non-attendees.

32 See: http://www.gallup.com/poll/166763/record-high-americansidentify-independents.aspx, last accessed 17 September 2014.

Figure V-2. Percentage of U.S. Adults who Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 

12 Months, or Who Expressed Interest in Attending But Did Not Follow Through, By Political Party 

Affiliation (2012)

Attendees Interested Non-Attendees

Strong Democrat Strong Republican Independent

Democrat Republican Other Party Affiliation

Independent, Leans Left Independent, Leans Right

19%

18%

13% 13%

8%

14%

3%

11% 19%

22%

14%

13%

11%

12%

8%

2%
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 43

In contrast, those who identified more weakly with the 

Democratic party, and left-leaning independent voters, 

were more likely to experience barriers to attendance. 

These individuals comprised 36 percent of interested 

non-attendees and 31 percent of current attendees. 

Finally, interested non-attendees were disproportionately 

independent or “swing” voters (38 percent, versus 34 

percent of current attendees) 

Public Expressions of Priorities, Values, and Needs

Personal values are also expressed through individuals’ 

priorities for the magnitude and distribution of government 

expenditures across different topical areas. Examining how 

these priorities differ among arts attendees, non-attendees 

with interest in attending, and uninterested non-attendees 

will prove instructive. 

For example, interested non-attendees are significantly 

more likely than current arts attendees to support 

increasing public expenditures for law enforcement 

and crime reduction. To some extent, this reflects the 

negative correlation between support for increased 

public expenditures in this category, and both household 

income and highest educational attainment. However, 

this spending priority also tends to receive strong 

support from non-Hispanic Black or African-American 

and multiracial U.S. citizens, two racial/ethnic groups that 

are disproportionately represented among interested 

non-attendees. 

Interested non-attendees are also significantly more likely 

than either actual attendees or uninterested non-attendees 

to support increasing public expenditures on welfare and 

income assistance for the poor. Support for this priority 

significantly increases in inverse proportion to household 

income. Accordingly, arts attendees—who tend to have 

higher household incomes overall—are significantly less 

likely than interested non-attendees to support increased 

spending in the category. 

Surprisingly, though, support for this spending priority 

is also a significant positive predictor of interest in arts 

attendance among non-attendees. In fact, even after 

controlling for a variety of factors (gender, race/ethnicity, 

age, household income, urbanicity, educational attainment, 

marital status, households with young children, and political 

party affiliation), we still find that interested non-attendees 

are significantly more likely to support increasing public 

expenditures to assist the poor.

Similar to current arts attendees but even more strongly, 

interested non-attendees support increasing public 

expenditures for education.33 Interested non-attendees 

are also more likely than either current attendees or 

uninterested non-attendees to say it is “extremely 

important” for young people to complete formal schooling, 

and to express that they are very interested in local 

school issues, but nonetheless that they have little or no 

confidence in the nation’s schools and educational system. 

Interested non-attendees also more often say it is “very 

unfair” that families with higher incomes can afford better 

education for their kids.

GSS data reveal several additional areas of public 

expenditure where interested non-attendees’ views tend to 

be part-way between those of current attendees and nonattendees. One such area is expenditures on mass transit, 

bridges, highways, and roads. Adults who report barriers 

to access in arts attendance—that is, it was too difficult 

to get to the exhibit or performance they were interested 

in attending—are correspondingly more likely to support 

increased public expenditures on mass transit, highways, 

and roads. Some 62 percent of interested non-attendees 

who said they found it too difficult to get to the exhibit or 

performance venue also supported increased expenditures 

on transportation infrastructure, compared with fewer than 

half of other interested non-attendees.

Individuals who expressed this specific combination of 

barriers to access and a desire for greater investment 

in roads and highways were most commonly African 

Americans and Hispanics living in suburban communities 

around the largest U.S. cities, or residents of rural areas.

33 The difference between interested versus uninterested nonattendees is significant even in a fully-specified model like the one 

described in the previous paragraph.
44 National Endowment for the Arts

Special Focus: Interest in Science, 

Scientific Occupations, and Arts 

Attendance

As noted in the first chapter of this report, the National 

Science Foundation is a major funder of the General 

Social Survey. Because cultural policy-makers, funders, 

and practitioners have evinced growing interest in the 

connections between art and science (popularized by the 

slogan “STEM to STEAM”), this chapter considers how arts 

attendance is related to pro-science attitudes and scientific 

occupations.

According to the 2012 GSS results, arts attendees and 

interested non-attendees are both significantly more likely 

than uninterested non-attendees to support increasing 

public expenditures for scientific research, and over 43 

percent indicate they are very interested in new scientific 

discoveries, compared with 30 percent of uninterested nonattendees of the arts. 

In addition, arts attendees are significantly more likely to 

value basic scientific research, that is, to agree or strongly 

agree that, “Even if it brings no immediate benefits, 

scientific research that advances the frontiers of knowledge 

is necessary and should be supported by the federal 

government.” 

Among adults in the U.S. workforce, arts attendees are 

significantly more likely than non-attendees to work in 

scientific occupations, even after controlling for educational 

and income levels. This finding is corroborated by a 2007 

study finding that “engineering or technology” ranked third 

out of the top 12 occupations reported by adults attending 

arts events at 14 major university-based arts presenters 

(Brown, 2007). Among adults aged 25 and over who had 

completed high school but had no bachelor’s degree and 

were not currently enrolled in school, individuals working in 

scientific occupations had a 21 percent higher probability of 

attending the arts than their similarly educated peers. 

For adults working in scientific occupations, arts attendance 

is less often influenced by a desire to socialize. Attendees 

who work in scientific occupations are significantly less likely 

to name socializing with family or friends as a major reason 

for attending, and they are also much less likely than other 

workers to say that not having someone to attend with 

prevented them from going. Instead, compared with other 

U.S. adult attendees, scientists more often name wanting 

to experience high-quality art as a major reason for exhibit 

attendance, and their attendance at performances is more 

often motivated by a desire to see a specific performer.

People working in scientific occupations who expressed an 

interest in attending the arts—but did not follow through—

most often say that work commitments or lack of time 

prevented them from attending a performance: 65 percent of 

scientists named this barrier to attendance, versus 47 percent 

of other adults in the workforce. In contrast, only four 

Figure V-3. Percentage of U.S. Adults Who Hold Scientific Occupations or Science-Related Values, 

by Whether They Attended the Visual and/or Performing Arts in the Past 12 Months or Expressed an 

Interest in Doing So (2012)

2.4%

23%

19%

3.0%

26%

22%

6.0%

25%

21%

0

5

10

15

20

25

Non-Attendees Interested Non-Attendees Attendees

Percent of U.S. Adults

Works in Scientific Occupation

Strongly Agrees S&T Provide More Opportunities for Next Generation

Strongly Agrees Federal Government Should Support Basic Science Research
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 45

percent of workers in scientific occupations felt the location 

of an exhibit was too difficult to get to, versus 30 percent of 

other workers who were interested but did not attend the 

arts. 

Workers in scientific occupations were relatively less likely 

than other workers to attend the arts alone, and they 

were significantly more likely to attend with their spouses 

or partners. In addition, people working in scientific 

occupations were less likely than other attendees to 

attend the arts with their friends. At the same time, those 

in scientific occupations who feel it is very important to 

help those around them and care for their well-being 

were overwhelmingly more likely also to attend the arts. 

Perhaps linked to this apparently greater family focus in 

their arts attendance, science workers were relatively less 

motivated to attend the arts out of support for their greater 

community.

Previous analysis using data from the 1993 GSS found 

that while art museum visitors and non-visitors did not 

differ significantly in their reported levels of confidence in 

major institutions (i.e., business, places of education, the 

executive branch of the government, Congress, the press, or 

television), arts attendees nonetheless were more likely to 

cite confidence in the scientific community than were adults 

who did not attend (p≤0.001) (DiMaggio, 1996). Consistent 

with these earlier findings, the 2012 GSS shows significant 

differences across arts attendees, interested non-attendees, 

and other non-attendees in their confidence in the scientific 

community, with high confidence reported at rates of 46 

percent, 41 percent, and 36 percent, respectively, across 

these groups.

Finally, perhaps consistent with the significantly greater 

support we observe for increasing public expenditures in 

education among interested non-attendees, it appears that 

interested non-attendees are most likely to strongly value 

science and technology for the opportunity it gives future 

generations versus other (disinterested) non-attendees and 

current arts attendees. 

Implications for Arts Practice

Our findings suggest a few strategies for arts organizations 

wishing to increase their attendance, based on the major 

audience segments we identify below, each at the nexus of 

observable demographics and less-observable values and 

motivations.

First, arts organizations and presenters seeking to build a 

more diverse audience base should recognize that wanting 

to learn and experience new things is a strong motivator 

for attendance, and that motivation is just as strong—if not 

stronger—among individuals with lower incomes and with 

no bachelor’s or higher degree.

Especially when presenting unfamiliar or experimental 

works that many might perceive as outside their comfort 

zone, organizations might consider coupling low-cost or 

free admission with an explicit focus on making the event 

accessible to adults motivated by learning new things. 

However, these organizations should also be aware that—

unlike the second audience segment we present below—

individuals who are motivated to attend the arts primarily 

due to low-cost or free admission also tend to have more 

material focus than those who attend for other reasons, 

placing higher value on wealth and having expensive 

things, and lower value on modesty or humility.

Second, interested non-attendees are more likely than 

others to value public investments in education and 

schools, and they are more concerned with physical safety 

and reducing crime. Current attendees who share these 

same priorities are more frequently motivated to attend 

the arts in order to support community organizations and 

events. 

Individuals who attend exhibits to support their 

communities tend to have lower household incomes, 

compared with other exhibit attendees, and individuals who 

attend performances for this reason tend to value modesty 

and humility more (and wealth or having expensive 

things less) than other performance attendees. Given 

these findings, local community-based arts organizations 

wishing to attract members of this missing audience might 

benefit from increasing their community engagement—

for example, offering educational activities for adults and 

families—and also from considering partnerships with 

schools or other community organizations to provide a 

safe, welcoming, and accessible venue for arts participation.

The third and fourth audience segments we identify are 

both primarily motivated to attend the arts to socialize 

with friends and family. However, they have different 

demographic and household characteristics and they also 

tend to hold somewhat different sets of personal values. 

The third segment is dominated by people who strongly 

value devotion and loyalty to those close to them. Among 

performance attendees, these are often women, or married 

men with no young children at home, who attend the 

arts with their spouses or partners. Marketing strategies 

that encourage couples’ attendance, recognizing that arts 

attendance is just one choice couples might make for time 

they spend together, would likely speak to these individuals.

By contrast, the people in the fourth segment are less likely 

to attend with a spouse or partner, and are more likely to 

attend with friends or other guests outside their immediate 

family. These individuals include unmarried women who 

attend art exhibits and who perceive themselves as creative 

and original, and performance attendees who prioritize 

adventure and risk-taking, and who value having wealth 

and expensive things. The barrier that interested nonattendees with similar demographics and values most often 

experience is lack of time, but cost is rarely an issue.
46 National Endowment for the Arts

Many of the individuals in this fourth segment, like the 

empty-nesters discussed in Chapter III, also said that 

experiencing high-quality art was a major reason for their 

attendance. Those who attended for this reason tended to 

emphasize listening to others’ opinions, even if different 

from their own. Exhibit-goers in this group were less 

concerned than other exhibit-goers with public education 

and placed less importance on devotion and loyalty to 

others. They were also more likely to be non-Hispanic 

Whites and first-generation immigrants residing in the 

largest U.S. cities. 

Consistent perhaps with the risk-taking value noted 

above, those who attended performances to experience 

high-quality art were also significantly less concerned 

with physical safety and reducing crime. Individuals with 

bachelor’s and higher degrees were significantly more likely 

than individuals with lower levels of educational attainment 

to attend performances for this reason.

Considering these findings, we believe that organizations 

providing opportunities for attendees to socialize, meet 

new people, and experience new art forms, in a flexible 

format that combines the arts with other activities these 

individuals enjoy, may be better able to attract and retain 

audience members from this group. For visual arts and live 

music performances, the top-donor gala events held in 

recent years at the Guggenheim and Museum of Modern 

Art in New York City, and similar events elsewhere that 

combine a cocktail party atmosphere with opportunities 

simultaneously to socialize and to enjoy the arts, might 

serve as an example.
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 47

Chapter VI. Conclusions

The documented decline in attendance at “benchmark” arts 

events over the last two decades is a continuing challenge 

for the nonprofit arts sector. The 2012 General Social Survey 

(GSS) provides nationally representative data that enable us 

to understand in greater depth why U.S. adults choose to 

attend (or not to attend) art exhibits and live performances. 

This report examined motivations for and barriers to 

arts attendance, taking advantage of the wide range of 

covariates available in the 2012 GSS: socio-demographic 

variables, life stages and family circumstances, and personal 

values.

By capturing data on interested non-attendees—individuals 

who expressed interest in attending at least one exhibit or 

performance within the past year, but who ultimately chose 

not to attend—the 2012 GSS provides unique insights into 

who is in the missing audience, and why they do not attend. 

Greater attention to the values, perceptions, and attitudes 

that actual attendees and interested non-attendees hold—

and the effects of life stages and life cycle transitions on 

motivations and barriers to attendance—may help us 

construct better pathways to grow arts participation overall, 

making the presentations and performances both more 

relevant and more accessible to the public. 

The GSS variables also provide insights and help us begin 

to better understand when disparities in attendance arise 

from differences in opportunities and not from differences 

in preferences or tastes for the arts.

It is important to reiterate that, historically, the types 

of events measured as “arts attendance” have been 

narrower than what is collected by the GSS. Much research 

and discussion within the nonprofit arts sector have 

been driven by reliance on the National Endowment 

for the Arts’ long-standing measures of attendance at 

“benchmark” arts events. Although this measure continues 

to prove useful for trend analysis, the NEA recently has 

seen fit to expand the survey so that other types of arts 

attendance are captured. Asking about arts attendance in 

a more inclusive way likely leads respondents to consider 

a wider range of events that they attend, or that they 

would be interested in attending. Thus, analyzing the 2012 

GSS’ arts questions (based on revised SPPA questions 

of the same year) necessarily entails a broader set of 

arts activities than have figured in empirically rooted 

discussions about attendance. 

Describing who attends the arts based solely on traditional 

demographic categories may be useful for policymakers 

concerned with equal access, but demographics alone 

provide little insight into why people do or do not attend 

the arts. This report instead integrates an understanding 

of the changing role that arts-going plays in the course 

of people’s lives, and the varied opportunities the arts 

may present for individuals to socialize and bond with 

their families and broader communities—whether with 

communities of geography, communities of shared 

cultural heritage, or communities of common interests. 

This report also offers quantitatively based insights for 

arts stakeholders and organizations.

Many U.S. arts organizations that offer live performances 

or exhibits are grappling with the impact of shifting 

demographics and the nation’s rapidly changing 

participatory culture. Although the art itself is often the 

basis of arts organizations’ missions, it may not be the 

quintessential element driving their audiences’ decision 

to attend. At the same time, these perspectives need 

not be at odds. Instead, these observations should spur 

artists and arts organizations to consider how they might 

better satisfy arts attendees’ motivations for attending, 

and potentially relieve barriers for those who express an 

interest in attending but do not currently follow through.

Socializing is a strong motivation for attending live 

performances, regardless of one’s income level. Yet 

one’s life stage influences a person’s social networks, 

with whom one is likely to attend the arts, and the 

dynamics of socializing at the event itself. Because 

spending time with family and friends so often motivates 

individuals’ attendance, in the aggregate this may create 

an environment that precludes individuals from feeling 

comfortable attending alone.

About one in five interested non-attendees said they 

ultimately didn’t attend because they could not find 

anyone to accompany them. This concern was equally 

prevalent among those interested in attending exhibits 

and performances, although those interested in attending 

performances were more likely to name the lack of a 

companion their “most important” barrier. Our analyses 

found that not having someone to go with is particularly a 

barrier to arts attendance among non-Hispanic Blacks and 

African Americans, as well as among Mexican-Americans. 

This barrier to attendance also appears salient for seniors 

aged 65 and older, especially those who are retired and 

live alone.

The notion that co-attendance is more important—

possibly even a deal-breaker—for prospective performance 

attendees is consistent with actual performance attendees’ 

significantly higher reported motivation to attend in 

order to socialize with family and friends. In addition, 

with so many arts attendees motivated to go primarily 

for a social experience—albeit one centered on art—arts 

organizations should consider how they can foster the 

types of relational experiences current and prospective 

attendees are seeking, and how they can use these 

linkages to build an audience that shares common 

interests and values. 
48 National Endowment for the Arts

For example, in some communities, this goal may best 

be realized by promoting opportunities for multiple 

generations to come together to celebrate their family’s 

racial or ethnic heritage, and to preserve and share 

their traditions and customs. In other communities, an 

audience might instead be built around people’s shared 

interest in experiencing and learning from a wide variety 

of new and different, high-quality arts presentations, with 

opportunities to discuss and socialize with others who 

have opinions different from one’s own. 

Budget and time constraints are real, but it is not clear 

whether removing these barriers would in fact increase 

arts attendance. With respect to cost, subsidizing arts 

organizations’ costs to lower the price of admission may 

strongly influence the decisions of some, especially those 

with household incomes below the top quartile. However, 

our report finds that only one in four attendees at free 

events claimed low cost was a “major reason” for their 

attendance. More often, attendees at free events were 

motivated by a desire to support events or organizations 

in their communities, or by an intrinsic desire to learn new 

things, regardless of the importance of low cost itself in 

their decisions.

Although lack of time—as we discuss in the section 

below—is a difficult barrier to address, one time-userelated finding is particularly worth noting. Parents with 

children under age six at home are significantly less likely 

to attend arts overall, and they are especially less likely 

to visit art museums. The most common barrier cited by 

interested non-attendees in this group is lack of time; and 

yet, these same individuals were about four times more 

likely to have visited the zoo one or more times in the past 

year. 

Perhaps recognizing these trends, some arts organizations 

have teamed up with zoos to make the arts more 

accessible to young families. Some examples of such 

efforts include Art on the Zoo Fence, a Hawaiian nonprofit that organizes exhibitions of artworks next to the 

Honolulu Zoo, the Brandywine Zoo’s Art in the Ark family 

program, which provides arts education classes (e.g., 

drawing, painting) with zoo animals as subjects, and 

the Zoo Music Concert Series at Albuquerque’s BioPark, 

which presents live music performances outdoors at 

the zoo, with open seating so families can come and 

go if needed. Co-locating arts events with other familyfriendly attractions and sites not only raises awareness 

and familiarity among non-attendees; it also effectively 

reduces the cost of attendance by reducing travel time.

Implications for Research

Although this report presents a great deal of descriptive 

evidence from the 2012 GSS, more still can be learned 

from these data. As noted, lack of time was the most 

commonly cited barrier to attendance among the 

13.3 percent of U.S. adults who reported interest in 

attending an exhibit or performance, but who did not 

follow through. More research is needed to understand 

differences in arts attendees’ and non-attendees’ 

respective leisure time constraints, and individuals’ 

priorities in how they choose to allocate their leisure 

time. Analyses of detailed time-use survey data may also 

provide greater insight into the opportunity cost that arts 

attendees incur, as well as offer suggestions for how arts 

organizations can effectively collaborate with other groups 

to help interested non-attendees find the time for arts 

attendance.

In addition, though some of the descriptive variables 

we generated for this report leveraged findings from 

earlier waves of the GSS, our analyses did not explicitly 

take advantage of the survey’s rolling panel design. 

Future research could examine not only the effect on arts 

attendance of particular life stages as we have done here, 

but also the impact of transitions that occurred during 

the panel—for example, considering individuals who 

transitioned from full-time work in 2008 to retirement in 

2012.

The 2012 GSS arts module provides important, nationally 

representative data assessing motivations and barriers to 

arts attendance, in the context of a larger survey of U.S. 

adults’ attitudes, values, and perceptions. If similar data 

are collected in future GSS surveys, we would suggest the 

following potential improvements:

• Re-introduce questions about attitudes towards 

arts, as in the 1993 and 1998 GSS Arts and Culture 

modules, including support for public expenditure 

on arts, to be asked of both attendees and 

non-attendees;

• Capture information to shed light on possible 

perceptual barriers among those who did not attend, 

including among those who did not express interest in 

attending any specific event;

• Obtain more detailed information about the types 

of art individuals attended, so that we can better 

discern, for example, whether there exist differences in 

motivations among attendees of classical music versus 

popular music concerts; and

• Given the importance of location as a motivation for 

exhibit attendance, explicitly determine whether exhibit 

attendees are describing a visit to an art museum 

versus an exhibit in another type of venue. 
When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 49

Implications for Policy

Prior research on arts attendance has determined that, on 

average, higher incomes and higher levels of educational 

attainment positively predict arts attendance. But for 

arts and cultural policymakers, addressing such systemic 

issues as disparities in education and income is a daunting 

task. Our analyses of the 2012 GSS identified these same 

descriptive trends, but also examined a broader range 

of related factors that may assist policymakers and arts 

organizations seeking to provide opportunities for greater 

participation in arts attendance from a more diverse 

audience base.

By looking at how income and education correlate 

with the values, perceptions, and behaviors with which 

individuals create their sense of identity, we can better 

understand how these preferences affect individuals’ arts 

attendance, and offer touch-points or levers for change.

One key finding from Chapter III was that much of the 

apparent education-related gap in attendance is due not 

to lack of interest among less-educated individuals, but 

rather to the barriers to attendance that they experience 

or perceive. Furthermore, while people at lower-income 

levels are less likely to attend performing arts events, they 

are just as likely as those at higher-income levels to attend 

art exhibits, which more often offer free admission. 

When these people do attend the arts, they attend 

more often to support their communities, to celebrate 

their cultural heritage, and because they want to gain 

knowledge and learn new things. But for some—and 

especially for racial and ethnic minorities—not having 

anyone to go with and difficulty in getting to the venue 

are more significant barriers than the price of admission. 

Focusing on addressing these motivations and barriers to 

attendance, rather than on systemic gaps in educational 

attainment or income, may help change perceptions and 

behavior around arts attendance.

Overall, available data on arts participation among U.S. 

adults has documented a decline in arts attendance. As 

the nonprofit arts sector works to adapt to demographic 

shifts in the population and the changing cultural 

landscape, the field will need to go beyond observations 

about behavior into the reasons driving that behavior—

why people do or do not attend, or why they aren’t even 

interested. The answers to these questions will provide 

vital information for helping the nonprofit arts sector 

adapt and change to meet new audience interests, tastes, 

and preferences.
50 National Endowment for the Arts

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When Going Gets Tough: Barriers and Motivations Affecting Arts Attendance 51

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