Expanding the Audience
 

For the Performing Arts
 
Expanding the Audience
 

For the Performing Arts
 

Alan R. Andreasen 

Research Division Report # 24
 

National Endowment for the Arts
 

Seven Locks Press
 

Washington
 
 

Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts is Report #24 in a series 

on matters of interest to the arts community commissioned by the Research Division of the National Endowment for the Arts. 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 

Andreasen, Alan R., 1934­

Expanding the audience for the performing arts / by Alan R. Andreasen 

p. 53 cm. -- (Research Division report; #241)
 

Includes bibliographical references.
 

ISBN 0-929765-01-X
 

1. Performing arts--United States--Audiences. 2. Performing arts-­

United States--Marketing. I. Title. II. Series: Research Division report 

(National Endowment for the Arts, Research Division); 24. 

PN2226.A53 1991 

791 ’.06’980973--dc20 90-23150 

CIP 

Manufactured in the United States of America 

Typeset by Edington-Rand, Inc. 

Printed by McNaughton & Gunn, Saline, MI 

Seven Locks Press is a Washington-based book publisher of nonfiction 

works on social, political and cultural issues. It takes its name from a 

series of lift locks on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. 

For more information or a catalog: 

Seven Locks Press 

P.O. Box 27 

Cabin John, MD 20818 

(301) 320-2130 
Table of Contents
 

INTRODUCTION 

PART I: DEFINITIONS AND BASIC MODEL 

PART II: METHODOLOGY 

Childhood Socialization 

Adult Socialization in the Arts 

Life-style 

General Leisure Activities 

Work Status 

Family Life Cycle 

Other Socioeconomic Characteristics 

Barriers to Attendance 

PART III: RESULTS 

Childhood Socialization 

Adult Socialization 

Life-style 

Work and Television Viewing 

Age and the Family Life Cycle 

Socioeconomic and Background Characteristics 

Barriers 

Arts Attended and Arts Sought 

Summary 

Discriminant Analysis 

PART IV: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 

Recommendations for Performing Arts Managers 

Insights from the Performing Arts Adoption 

Process Model 

Empirical Insights 

Research Recommendations 

NOTES 

APPENDIX A: Candidate Variables for Discriminant Analysis 

About the Author 

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v
 
INTRODUCTION 

Organizations involved in producing or funding the performing arts have 

been heartened by evidence of the growing popularity of their offerings. This 

is reflected in steadily growing attendance at opera and symphony concerts 

and at legitimate theater, especially regional theater, since 1970.1 Undoubtedly, performing arts organizations have benefitted from a long-term improvement in the socioeconomic status of the general population, since 

attendance at these types of events is closely correlated with income, education and occupation.2 

It is equally clear, however, that the recent growth in attendance can be 

at least partly attributed to carefully planned interventions by arts organizations. These have been both indirect and direct. Indirect interventions have 

included the proliferation of programming of the arts on television, the 

increased availability of videocassettes of arts performances, formation of 

cable television arts networks, and dramatically increased quality of recorded 

music reproduction (e.g. compact disks). Direct interventions have included 

audience-building marketing efforts such as imaginative advertising, complicated and enticing subscription programs, ticket-selling booths in places 

such as shopping malls and railroad stations, telemarketing, informative 

preprogram lectures, and shirtsleeve performances. 

In the present political and economic environment, producers and supporters of the performing arts face rapidly mounting pressures to expand 

audiences for their performances. Since this is essentially a marketing 

problem, arts managers have increasingly turned to the marketing literature 

for help. Unfortunately, the manager is likely to find that, with very few 

exceptions, the literature is extremely sparse and often not very useful. 

Stated very simply, arts managers who wish to build an arts audience 

have at their disposal a number of marketing instruments that can be used at 

some level of cost to achieve audience development goals. These instruments 

include marketing’s traditional "four Ps," product, price, promotion, and 

place of offering, plus other tools such as public relations. The manager 

typically would like help with four kinds of decisions: 

1.	 How to segment the market into mutually exclusive target populations 

that can be the focus of one or more marketing interventions; 

2.	 How much to allocate to marketing effort in each segment, including no 

effort; 
Alan R. Andreasen 

3.	 On what to expend marketing effort (e.g. reducing price, increasing 

advertising, changing the offer); and 

4.	 When to approach a segment with a particular strategy. 

The question of when to approach particular market segments has received inadequate attention in the marketing literature. It is possible, however 

that at any ipoint, consumers will vary in their readiness-to-change with 

respect to any particular behavior, such as attendance at the performing arts. 

Further, different consumers at a given stage of "readiness," or at different 

stages of readiness, may vary in the kinds of interventions they will respond 

to.3 

If a marketer is to be effective and cost-efficient in using resources to 

develop markets, it is essential to learn more about which consumers are 

ready for which kind of intervention to change their behavior. The need to 

be more effective and cost-efficient is especially serious in the performing 

arts where budgets are extremely limited. Research that helps arts managers 

understand how and when to approach particular segments of the market 

would be valuable. 

If marketers are to change consumer behavior with respect to performing 

~trts attendance, they must understand more about the process by which 

people come: to attend performances. It is quite obvious that people do not 

become deeply involved in the performing arts overnight; it is a gradual 

process. Some become very active and committed, some only marginally 

active, and the majority not involved at all. Thus, when we speak of 

consumers’ readiness-to-change, we are really talking about consumers’ 

readiness to become more committed to attending the performing arts. 

Given this framing of the issue, the difficulty one faces in making 

recommendations for the future development of arts audiences is that we do 

not have any clear understanding, conceptually or empirically, of that process 

by which someone becomes a committed, involved arts attender. 

The present paper represents an attempt to provide a beginning understanding of that process. It outlines a hierarchical model of the audience 

develoPment process and then utilizes a set of secondary cross-sectional data 

to begin to understand the transitions a consumer makes from being uninterested to being highly committed to the arts. The paper describes consumers at various stages in this process, attempts to learn what seems most 

related to transitions between stages, and then makes recommendations for 

both managerial action and further research based on the model and the 

study’s primary findings. 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

I: DEFINITIONS AND BASIC MODEL 

Individuals do not become members of the audience for the performing 

arts by chance. Attendance is the result of a developmental process by which 

each individual progresses from a lack of awareness and interest through 

several stages of consistent, growing involvement, eventually becoming an 

active participant. 

Although participation in the arts may comprise many other things 

besides attendance--performing, or working backstage, enjoying the arts 

through other media such as books, radio, recordings, and television--here 

we are considering only attendance at live performances. Indeed, other kinds 

of participation may be complements or substitutes for live attendance. 

Each individual’s progression towards deeper commitment to performing arts attendance can be described in terms of two measures: interest and 

attendance. Further, it can be assumed that those who are now the most 

actively committed to arts attendance once upon a time were uninvolved and 

disinterested. For some, involvement and interest in the arts started very early 

in life. For others, it started later. And, of course, for the majority of 

Americans, interest and involvement has never grown or has grown very 

little. 

Both interest and attendance can be thought of as a hierarchy with a great 

many potential positions that can be occupied over a lifetime. There is a 

substantial body of literature in the social sciences that suggests that, in 

acquiring any new behavior, individuals pass through a number of definable 

stages. These steps are often referred to as the "adoption process. ,,4 Adapting 

this approach to the present case permits one to postulate five major transition 

points across six stages as individuals progress from lack of interest and 

involvement to active participation and interest in the performing arts. The 

six stages outlined in Figure 1 are given labels borrowed directly from the 

adoption literature. The transition points may be described as follows: 

1.	 Changing from being a nonattender and disinterested to first becoming 

interested in attendance, that is, moving from Stage I, Disinterest, to 

Stage II, Interest," 

2.	 Changing from being merely interested in the arts to attending a first arts 

event, that is, moving from Interest to Stage III, Trial," 

3. Changing from attending a first arts event to being interested in further 

attendance, that is, moving from Trial to Stage IV, Positive Evaluation; 

4. Changing from being merely interested in further attendance to attending 

3 
Alan R. Andreasen 

I. DISINTEREST 

II. INTERESTI 

II1. TRIAL 

IV. POSITIVE EVALUATION 

CONFIRMATION 

Figure 1. The Performing Arts Adoption Process 

many events, that is, moving from Positive Evaluation to Stage V, 

Adoption; 

o Changing from attending many performing arts events to also being 

interested in attending many more, that is, moving from mere adoption 

to Stage VI, Confirmation. 

This adapted hierarchical model will be called the performing arts 

adoption process. 

The model is, of course, an idealized progression. It is not expected that 

individuals will progress neatly through all six stages to reach the end point. 

Because of changes in circumstances, individuals who have passed to a 

relatively advanced stage may regress to an earlier stage before moving on 

to the next stage. Some may move through most of the stages and then decide 

4 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

to reverse the process and permanently reduce their attendance. It is also 

possible that some individuals will skip some stages, or simply stop at some 

point and progress no farther. 

An opportunity to understand the performing arts adoption process is 

offered by the availability of data from the 1982 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA).5 The study was prepared and administered to a 

nationwide sample of adult Americans by the Bureau of the Census. It 

contains information on involvement in various aspects of the arts, both 

directly and through the media, and detailed background information on 

each household, including standard demographics and several dimensions 

of household life-style. 

The present paper represents a new analysis of the SPPA data to answer 

four related questions: 

1.	 What characteristics describe individuals at each of the six stages of the 

performing arts adoption process? 

2.	 What characteristics discriminate between those individuals occupying 

adjacent stages in the performing arts adoption process? 

3. What do these discriminating variables explain about the process by 

which an individual moves from one stage to the next? 

4. What do these findings reconm-mnd to those managers seeking to expand 

audiences for the performing arts? 

Implicit in the conceptualization underlying the present analysis are three 

theoretical assumptions: 

(a)	 Audience development is best facilitated by recognizing that target 

consumers are at different stages with respect to progression from 

complete disinterest to extensive involvement; 

(b)	 The performing arts adoption process is a reasonable specification of the 

stages and the sequence of progression; and 

(c) The most reasonable objective for audience development is to move each 

segment to the next stage rather than to move each segment directly to 

the stage of greatest involvement. 

The variables used to describe and explain progression through the 

performing arts adoption process are those measured or approximated by the 

data in the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts. The set of variables 

explored here is based on the notion that increased attendance is likely to 

occur if: 

5 
Alan R. Andreasen 

1.	 The individual has somehow learned to appreciate the performing arts; 

2.	 The individual has a life-style that includes or is compatible with 

attending the performing arts; 

3.	 The individual does not satisfy the need for entertainment entirely from 

other media; 

4.	 The individual is not yet satiated with attendance; and/or 

5.	 The individual does not perceive major barriers to increased attendance. 

Each major variable will, in turn, be affected by other factors. For 

example, learning to appreciate the arts can take place early in life, and this 

is presumably affected by whether one’s parents were well educated and/or 

participated in the arts themselves. Further, whether an individual perceives 

certain barriers as important impediments to further attendance will be a 

function of such factors as income and marital and family status. 

Some of the variables to be explored here are at least partially controllable 

by arts managers; most are not. Some, such as eliminating specific barriers, 

are controllable in the short run. Others, such as introducing more people to 

the arts at an earlier age, are only "controllable" in the long run. 

The focus here is limited to attendance at six performing arts activities: 

jazz, classical music, opera, musical plays, ballet, and legitimate theater. We 

are explicitly not considering other arts attendance such as visits to museums. 

There are several reasons for making this distinction. The most basic reason 

is that these six live performing arts are assumed to be part of the same 

market: They involve being entertained by the performances of live human 

beings, they are almost never free, and they typically involve considerable 

preplanning and additional expenses for babysitting, dinner, transportation 

and the like.6 Finally and most importantly, these art forms are usually seen 

as substitutes for each other.7 

6 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

I1: METHODOLOGY 

The basic model for expanding the audience for the performing arts rests 

on a simple premise: becoming involved in the arts is not a one-step process, 

but is a progression through six stages called the "performing arts adoption 

process." Although the model appeals to common sense, it should not 

become the basis for policy or action unless it has been tested further with 

other databases and other methodologies. One could argue that the model 

conforms to the "reality" of this database. What one needs is a different 

approach to validate the "stages" and the basic notion of "progression." 

To test the model and explore its implications, data from the Survey of 

Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA) are used. The database consisted of 

responses from 2,678 persons who were surveyed during the months of 

November and December 1982. Two changes were made in this database. 

Potential target members who could not advance along the performing arts 

adoption process either because of ill health or a handicap were excluded 

from the analysis. Excluding these 69 respondents and two others for whom 

there was incomplete data brought the final sample size to 2,607. 

Another group of 370 respondents could not advance along the hierarchy 

because a specific art form was unavailable where they lived. These individuals were retained in the sample, but their responses about the unavailable art form are excluded. 

This revised sample is assumed to be representative of the U.S. adult 

population. Although the responses contain random "noise" due to questionnaire design, administration, and tabulation, there is no systematic bias 

evident. 

The SPPA surveyed individuals at o~ze point in time at a specific stage in 

the performing arts adoption process. Assuming that these individuals have 

moved there from the preceding stage allows us to explain ~ransitio,zs by 

assuming that those in an earlier stage will move to the next stage if they 

adopt certain characteristics that distinguish them from those in the next 

group. As noted earlier, it is recognized that this is a major assumption and 

that it is very likely that some members in each of the six categories may 

have "moved" there from several stages away or from a later rather than an 

earlier stage. A true test of the model must await the existence of tracking 

data on the same households at several points over time. 

The first task in the present analysis was to categorize respondents into 

the six stages of the performing arts adoption process. After excluding cases 
Alan R. Andreasen 

where art forms were unavailable, respondents were categorized into the six 

stages as follows: 

I.	 DISINTEREST: Has not attended any of the six performing arts forms 

in the last twelve months and is not interested in attending; 

II. INTEREST: Has not attended any of the six performing arts forms in the 

last twelve months but is interested in attending; 

III. TRIAL: Has attended one performance of one or more of the six 

performing arts forms in the last twelve months and is not interested in 

attending more often; 

IV. POSITIVE EVALUATION: Has attended one performance of one or 

more of the six performing arts forms in the last twelve months and is 

interested in attending more often; 

V. ADOPTION: Has attended two or more performances of one or more of 

the six performing arts forms in the last twelve months but is not 

interested in attending more often; 

VI. CONFIRMATION: Has attended two or more performances of one or 

more of the six performing arts forms in the last twelve months and is 

interested in attending more often. 

Since the six performing arts are assumed to be: substitutes for each other, 

increased attendance can be measured both as more attendance at the same 

performing arts form or as attendance at several different arts forms. This 

assumption is consistent with initial analyses of this database by Robinson 

et al., where they found high correlations among the six performing arts 

forms. It is also assumed that the lack of interest in attending more often on 

the part of individuals assigned to the Trial stage is temporary and not 

evidence of a negative trial experience. 

Table 1 shows the distribution of the entire sample across the six stages. 

Approximately one half of the sample is in Stage I, Disinterest. Many of those 

at this stage, probably the majority, are unlikely to progress to the next stage 

because those in Stage I are very much unlike those in any other stage. 

Table 1 indicates that a further one-fifth of the sample has only progressed 

to Stage II, Interest. Thus, 70 percent of the sample was found to be at the 

very beginning stages of the performing arts adoption process. While this 

may seem discouraging at first glance, the fact that 22 percent of the sample 

is at Stage II suggests a significant untapped potential among nonattenders. 

The individuals who comprise the remaining 30 percent of the sample 

have attended at least one event in the past twelve months. One-half of them 

8 
Table 1
 

Sample Distribution Across Stages of the Performing
 

Arts Adoption Model
 

Stage in Process Number Percent 

I. Disinterest 1,225 47.0% 

II. interest 579 22.2% 

III. Trial 172 6.6% 

IV. Positive evaluation 307 11.8% 

V. Adoption 98 3.8% 

Vl. Confirmation 226 8.7% 

Total 2,607 100.0% 

have only attended a single event while the others have already attended two 

or more in the last year. 

Before moving to an analysis of each stage and the transitions between 

them, one must ask whether the data offer general empirical support for the 

validity of the model, the performing arts adoption process. The model has 

face validity in that it describes a logical progression based on common sense, 

the experience of those in the field, and conceptualizations and findings of 

those in other social science fields. But does the model predict relationships 

that do in fact appear in the data? 

Three sets of associations ,are offered as predictive support. In the 

literature on performing arts attendance and in the initial analysis of both the 

1982 and 1985 SPPA, researchers have found that participation in the 

performing arts is positively associated with (a) education, (b) participation 

in a wide range of other activities (referred to as the "more-more" phenomenon) and (c) consumption of the arts through other media.8 If the present 

model meets the test of predictive validity, there should be systematic 

increases in levels of education, general activity and arts media consumption 

measures from one stage to the next. 

Table 2 shows that the model meets this test of predictive validity. Table 

2 reports data on average years of education and the percent attending college 

for individuals at each stage of the process. It also records two measures of 

activity: the average number of different out-of-home activities in which 

those at each stage participated, and the average number of total activities 

including at-home activities, hobbies and crafts, and working backstage on 
Table 2
 

Education, Leisure Activity, and Media
 

Participation by Stage in Model
 

Mean Number 

Stage in Process 

Mean 

Years of 

Education 

Percentage 

Attending 

College 

of Art Activities 

In-home Out-of-home Via media 

I. Disinterest 11.0 18.8% 2.88 3.22 .52 

II. interest 12.7 39.7% 4.10 5.29 .94 

Ill. Trial 13.0 47.7% 4.31 6.17 1.42 

IV. Positive evaluation 13.6 57.0% 4.55 6.62 1.55 

V. Adoption 

Vl. Confirmation 

14.2 

14.7 

65.3% 

74.3% 

4.63 

4.86 

7.02 

8.00 

2.29 

2.65 

the arts (see Table 5 for listing of out-of-home and in-home activities). 

Finally, it shows the average number of other media used to appreciate the 

arts. In each case, the progression from Stage I to Stage VI is systematic, 

linear and continuous, although the transitions between each stage are not 

always statistically significant. 

In the present analysis it is assumed that an individual’s present stage in 

the performing arts adoption process is a function of seven sets of variables: 

childhood socialization, adult socialization, life-style, work status, family life 

cycle, barriers to participation, and other socioeconomic characteristics such 

as race, sex.., and income. 

Childhood Socialization 

The stage of a sample member at the time of the study is strongly 

influenced by his or her early exposure to the arts. Several studies have found 

that this is, indeed, an important predictor of attendance at the performing 

arts? This exposure could come about in one of two ways. First, individuals 

could have parents who encouraged them to take an interest in attending the 

arts. In the SPPA, two questions explored this factor. First, respondents were 

asked whether, when they were growing up, parents or other adult members 

of the household listened to classical music or opera, or took the respondent 

to plays, dance, or classical music performances. Respondents were asked 

whether this happened never, occasionally or often. For the present analysis, 

an "early encouragement index" was constructed by weighting answers of 

10 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

"often" twice as much as answers of "occasionally." Thus, this index could 

range from zero to four. 

Second, individuals could have been encouraged by their parents to 

attend classes in an art form. In the SPPA, respondents were asked whether 

they took lessons or classes in four categories: music (either voice training 

or playing an instrument), acting or theater, ballet, or music appreciation. 

These questions were asked for four age ranges: under 12, 12 to 17, 18 to 24 

and 25 or older. A "childhood arts education index" was constructed by 

counting how often an individual reported having had classes in each of the 

four categories in each of the two age groupings under 18. Thus, an individual’s "childhood arts education index" score could range from zero to 

eight. 

In addition to these two indexes, we shall also observe the proportion of 

respondents at each stage who were both encouraged by adults to participate 

in the arts and given classes as a child. 

Adult Socialization in the Arts 

It is also possible that individuals will develop or extend an interest in 

the arts as adults. Many individuals obtain their first exposure to the performing arts in college either through direct exposure or through the influence of 

fellow students. To assess this possibility a dichotomous variable for attendance at college was created, i.e. whether a given respondent did or did not 

attend college. 

There are two other possibilities for adult socialization. First, adults could 

take the same kinds of classes they took (or could have taken) as a child. 

Second, they could be exposed to the performing arts on radio, television, or 

recordings. 

To permit analysis of these factors, an "adult arts education index" was 

constructed in the same manner as the childhood arts education index 

discussed earlier, with values ranging from zero to four. In addition, a 

dichotomous measure of whether a respondent had any adult education in 

the arts was also constructed. For the three electronic media, separate indexes 

were constructed for exposure to arts such as jazz, classical music, opera, 

musical stage plays or operettas, nonmusical stage plays, and ballet on 

television (range of the index is zero to six), radio (range of the index is zero 

to five) and records or tapes (range of the index is zero to four). 

The problem with adult classes and media exposure, however, is that they 

may be an effect of attendance at live performances rather than a cause. 

11 
Alan R. Andreasen 

Further, it may be that exposure in other media could be a substitute for live 

attendance. 

Life-style 

General Leisure Activities 

Interest and participation in the arts do not occur in isolation. It is part of 

an overall "life-style" which, in the marketing literature, is typically measured by an individual’s activities, interests, and opinions. These are sometimes called AIO measures.l° Bureau of Census interviewers took measures 

on a number of life-style dimensions. One set of 14 questions asked about 

general leisure activities. Respondents were asked whether in the previous 

twelve months they had: 

1.	 Attended movies, sports events, zoos or gardens, or amusement parks; 

2.	 Pursued hobbies such as games, collecting, preparing special meals or 

gardening; 

3.	 Engaged in physical activities such as exercising or jogging, playing 

sports, or camping; 

4.	 Read books, magazines, or novels; 

5.	 Did volunteer work; and/or 

6.	 Worked on home improvements or vehicle repairs. 

In addition, the SPPA asked respondents to indicate how many hours 

they watched television (presumably in their leisure time) "on an average 

day." 

A second set of questions asked about activities of a "cultural" nature 

other than attendance at the six types of art fOrThS that are the major focus of 

this analysis. Respondents were asked whether the3, had: 

1.	 Visited an art museum, a science museum, a historic site, or an arts and 

crafts fah’; 

2.	 Read or listened to poetry;
 

3. Undert~:en arts and crafts activities;
 

z!. Worked behind the scenes at performing-arts performances; and/or
 

5.	 Engaged in creative writing.
 

Because it is essential to understand whether particular individual activities show np as important to consumers presently at specific stages of the 

12 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

process, each activity is analyzed separately.11 Understanding the activities 

that ,are more often associated with a particular stage may help to round out 

our understanding of the people who are currently there. 

Once this analysis of individual activities is completed, we will turn our 

attention to general summary indexes of the activities based principally on 

logic and preliminary analyses of the data. 

Work Status 

A second important dimension of one’s life-style is work status; that is, 

whether a respondent works and, if so, in what type of occupation and for 

how many hours a week. It is particularly important to know how many 

hours an individual works, because this will indicate the amount of leisure 

time available for activities such as attending the performing arts. Further, 

certain occupations might encourage or "require" such attendance. It is 

assumed that professional or managerial occupations fit this category. The 

present analysis, therefore, explicitly includes each respondent’s total nun> 

bet of working hours and whether the respondent was in a managerial or 

professional occupation. 

Family Life Cycle 

An individual’s life-style is inextricably linked to family status. Engaging 

in certain leisure activities (or avoiding them) will often be determined by 

whether one is young and single, has children living at home, or is elderly 

and retired. One study has noted: 

From the point of view of consumption, there are several other 

factors that vary systematically as the individual progresses 

through such a life cycle. Besides age and income, the individual’s 

needs and tastes change. Responsibilities for other family members 

change with the size of the family and the self-sufficiency of its 

members, and there are systematic changes in accumulated experience, accumulated and desired durable goods, and accumulated savings and other liquid assets. Finally, when children and 

spouse are present, their needs, preferences and abilities are also 

changing as is the pattern of interaction for the family as a whole.12 

A substantial number of studies in the marketing literature have confirmed this point.~? 

13 
Alan R. Andreasen 

In the present analysis, individuals were categorized into six life-cycle 

groupings based on age, marital status, and whether they have children and 

the ages of children as follows (percentages of total sample indicated in 

parentheses): 

I.	 Young and single. Divorced or never married and under 35 years of age 

(11.8%). 

II.	 Young, married and no children (6.5%). 

lII. Young children at home. Married, single, or divorced with one or more 

children under 6 years of age (18.5%). 

IV. Older children. Married, single or divorced with children, none of whom 

is under 6 years of age (21.4%). 

V. Older, no children. Age between 35 and 64 and no children (26.5%). 

VI. Elderly. Age 65 and older (14.9%). 

Other Socioeconomic Characteristics 

There are a number of other socioeconomic characteristics in addition to 

education, occupation and family life cycle that may be related to arts 

attendance.~4 

Among them are income, race, place of residence (specifically, whether 

~he individual resides in a Standm’d Metropolitan Statistical Area or not), 

household size, and gender. Several of these may be related to a respondent’s 

stage in the performing arts adoption process. However, an earlier study by 

Andreasen and Belk found that, while socioeconomic characteristics were 

related to performing arts attendance, this relationship was mainly due to 

their also being correlated with such factors as life-style and early socialization in the arts, although the latter could also be related to socioeconomic 

status. In a multivariate analysis, life-style and ,early socialization were 

shown to be much more important determinants of attendance.15 

Barriers to Attendance 

Individuals in Stages II, IV and VI of the performing arts adoption 

process expressed interest in attending the arts more often, but are not doing 

so. In such cases, SPPA interviewers asked their reasons for not attending. 

In addition to illness or unavailability of an art form, a great many other 

reasons were indicated by respondents. Five predominated and will be used 

in the present analysis. These are: cost, lack of time, problems associated 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

with travel ("too far to go" or "transportation/traffic/parking problems"), 

personal barriers ("feel uncomfortable," "don’t have anyone to go with," 

"babysitter problems/must care for children," or "crime or fear of crime") 

and lack of motivation. 16 

A Note on Statistical Significance 

Classical statistics recommends stringent criteria when reporting something as 

"significant." Typically, this means that something should be ignored if the chance 

of a particular finding really being non-significant is greater than five percent. Several 

of the findings reported here meet this criterion. Since this is an exploratory study, 

we have adopted less stringent tests for reporting some of the data, namely that the 

chance of being wrong is no greater than ten percent. Since there is a very small 

base of research in this area that is useful to marketers, we decided to let the data 

reveal as much suggestive material as possible by allowing a 10% chance of error. 

In general, the narrative does not distinguish between findings that meet the stricter 

test; however, the tables clearly report significance levels for those readers who wish 

to reinterpret the findings using narrower tolerances. 

15
 
 

Alan R. Andreasen 

II1. RESULTS 

The data on the characteristics of respondents at different stages of the 

performing arts adoption process reveal one dramatic, persistent pattern that 

affects both our conclusions and the manner in which the analyses proceed. 

As seen in Tables 3 through 9, respondents in Stage: I, those disinterested and 

not attending the arts, are dramatically different from those in the other five 

stages. For example, they are much less likely to ihave been exposed to the 

arts as children or to have attended college. They are significantly less likely 

to be exposed to the performing arts in other media, such as radio, television, 

or tapes and records, to take classes in the arts, or to engage in related crafts 

and, in point of fact, they are less likely to engage in any of the activities 

measured in this study. 

It is very clear that the distance between those at Stage I and those in 

Stages II through VI of the performing arts adoption process is not just 

significant. It represents a chasm. The size of this gulf implies that those in 

Stage I are the least ready of any of the six groups to change their involvement 

Table 3
 

Selected Measures of Childhood Socialization
 

in the Arts by Stage in Model
 

I II II1 IV V VI 

Dis- Positive 

Childhood Socialization Measure interested Interested Trial Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Early encouragement index 

Child arts education index 

.41 

.47 

.80t 

.89t 

.69 

.98 

1.06t 

1.15 

1.46t 

1.20 

1.42 

1.69t 

Total socialization index .88 1.69t 1.67 2.21t 2.66 3.11t 

Any parental encouragement 

Any classes as child 

29.1% 

34.8% 

48.0%t 

62.7%t 

44.8% 

62.8% 

57.3% 

67.1% 

65.3% 

72.4% 

69.9% 

77.9% 

Parental encouragement 

AND classes 25.4% 34.9%t 36.6% 44.0% 53.1% 59.3% 

Parental encouragement 

OR classes 47.6% 75.8%t 70.9% 80.8% 84.7% 89.8% 

Attended college 

Mean years of education 

18.8% 

11.0 

39.7%I" 

12.7t 

47.7% 

13.0 

57.0% 

13.6 

65.3% 

14.2t 

74.3% 

14.7 

1Significantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or 

better. 

16 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

in the arts. Attempts to move consumers across the chasm are likely to be 

very expensive and not very successful. 

Because those in Stage I represent a market segment that from an 

efficiency standpoint should be of lesser interest to performing arts managers, 

our focus in the analyses to follow is primarily on the remaining five stages. 

This is not to say that some managers might not justifiably choose, from a 

cultural equity standpoint, to pursue efforts to reach those in Stage I, only 

that it would be less efficient and is not the focus of this paper. 

Childhood Socialization 

It was hypothesized that an adult’s present status in the performing arts 

adoption process will be strongly influenced by socialization in the arts as a 

child. Table 3 indicates two important patterns with respect to the last five 

stages of the performing arts adoption process. First, there is a clear increase 

in the amount of childhood socialization between people at Stage II and those 

at Stage VI, but childhood socialization apparently becomes important only 

when one moves beyond the trial stage. Early childhood socialization appears 

to have the important effect of producing individuals who quickly become 

interested in the performing arts, moving quickly to an interest in attending 

two or more events (Stage IV) or actually doing so (Stages V and VI). 

Adult Socialization 

Table 4 reports data on the extent to which stages in the performing arts 

adoption process are associated with a college education and being involved 

in the performing arts in some other form, either through taking classes or 

through exposure in other media. It shows that all of the measures increase 

as one moves forward in the performing arts adoption process. 

It is reasonable to conclude that a college education speeds one along the 

process. However, with respect to adult classes and consumption through 

other media, it is not possible to conclude from cross-sectional data whether 

the positive relationships represent cause, effect, or simultaneity. With 

respect to consuming the arts through other media, the data do permit us to 

conclude that this is not a substitute for attendance at live performances. 

Table 4 also indicates that consumption through the media increases dramatically at Stage IV, the point at which consumers positively evaluate the 

performing arts. Thus it seems reasonable to speculate that increased media 

consumption may be a part of a pattern of generally increased interest in the 

performing arts rather than a cause or effect. 

17 
 

Table 4: Selected Measures
 

of Adult Socialization in the Performing Arts
 

by Stage in Model
 

I II III IV V VI 

Adult Socialization Measure 

Disinterested Interested Trial 

Positive 

Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Adult arts education index .11 .31t .41 .49 .73t .92 

Percent taking classes 

as adult 13.7% 36.3%t 38.4% 45,9% 54.1% 72.6%t 

Number of art activities 

via media: 

radio 

records/tapes 

television 

Total, all media 

.18 

.18 

.43 

.79 

.59t 

.57t 

1.28t 

2.44t 

.54 

.59 

1.38 

2.51 

.68 

.89I" 

1.89t 

3.46t 

.99t 

1.07 

2.34t 

4.40t 

1.26 

1.58t 

2.68 

5.53t 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or 

better. 

The data on adult classes show a different but understandable pattern. 

Consumption does not dramatically increase until consumers are actually 

attending multiple events rather than just being interested in doing so (i.e., 

Stage V). Taking classes, like attending performances, requires a commitment of time and effort. Increasing both at the same point would seem 

perfectly consistent. On the other hand, increasing one’s interest (Stage IV) 

is a relatively passive step forward, not requiring a change in behavior. 

Furthermore, one may expect to find significant increases in exposure to the 

arts via the media at this stage because that, too, requires very little effort and 

commitment. This is, indeed, the case. 

Life-style 

The data in Table 5 report the proportion of those at each of the six stages 

of the performing arts adoption process engaging in 30 different activities 

within the last twelve months. Table 6 then summarizes these data into five 

indexes and an overall "general activity" measure for the sample. These 

groupings are based on logical considerations and preliminary analyses of 

the data rather than factor analyses.17 

18 
Table 5: Percentage Engaged in Leisure Activities
 

by Stage in Model 

II ill IV V Vl Number 

Dis. Positive Reporting Activity Interested Interested Trial Evaluation Adoption Confirmation Activity 

Out-of-home Individual 

Goto movies 48.3% 71.3%t 79.1%t 82.6% 78.1% 86.2% 1660
 

Goto sports 36.6% 52.3%t 57.6% 64.8% 67.4% 75.0% 1279
 

Camp/hike 29.8% 36.8%t 44.2%t 47.9% 53.1% 51.8% 966
 

Play sports 27.5% 46.5%t 55.2%t 51.1% 55.2% 59.4% 1042
 

Exercise, jog 37.8% 57.8%t 62.8% 71.7%t 66.7% 78.6% 1361
 

Do charity work 18.2% 29.1%t 39.6%t 38.4% 60.4%t 58.9% 765
 

Out-of-home Family 

Visit art museum 6.7% 20.4%t 35.5%t 35.2% 53.1%1 64.6%$ 567 

Visit science museum 10.4% 24.7%t 29.1% 34.2% 42.7% 49.1% 574 

Visit historic site 21.7% 43.5%t 52.6%1 60.2% 58.3% 75.0%t 1014 

Visit art fair 24.4% 46.8%t 54.7%1" 60.7% 65.6% 77.2%t 1084 

Visit amusement park 40.0% 58.2%t 62.8% 64.6% 59.4% 56.7% 1314 

Visitzoo 21.3% 39.4%t 39.2% 49.3%t 45.8% 61.2%$ 886 

Creative 

Do crafts 8.8% 15.9%1" 20.3% 14.4% 17.7% 14.7% 326 Do needlecrafts 38.2%1 27.4% 41.3% 47.2% 38.5% 40.6% 890 Paint, sculpt 5.7% 12.3%1" 16.3% 11.1% 21.9%1" 21.0% 270 Write poems, stories 2.3% 6.4%1" 9.3% 9.2% 17.7%t 21.9% 175 

Take art class 4.8% 12.8%t 11.0% 16.4% 25.0%~ 21.0% 272 

Do photography 5.7% 10.2%t 14.5% 16.4% 19.8% 24.1% 276 Play musical instrument 3.3% 2.4% 2.3% 13.3% 107 t 13.1% 9.3% Act, sing, dance 3.3% 4.5%t 5.2% 3.6% 13.3% 10.6% 124 

In-home 

Playgames 51.5% 74.4%t 76.6% 83.6%$ 77.1% 81.3% 1702 Read books, magazines 70.6% 90.5%t 94.8% 98.0%;: 95.8% 97.3% 2156 Read novels, poetry 38.8% 64.1%t 68.4% 78.2%t 78.6% 88.0%t 1473 Collect stamps, coins 10.0% 22.7%$ 16.6%t 20.3% 27.1% 23.7% 398 Cook gourmet meals 18.8% 31.4%t 32.6% 40.8%;: 50.0% 53.6% 760 Repair home, vehicle 50.0% 69.7%t 65.5% 67.2% 77.1%;: 73.2% 1562 Garden 49.2% 63.4%1 71.5%$ 70.1% 65.6% 72.8% 1530 Read, tistento poetry 9.0% 21.6%t 24.4% 32.1%;: 46.9%t 50.4% 533 

Backstage 

Music, play, ballet .7% 1.7%$ 4.7%;: 4.9% 6.3% 10.3% 70 Jazz, classical performance 0.0% .7%t 1.2% 1.6% 4.2% 3.1% 22 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05level of significance or better; tSignificantly different from the precedingstage at the. 10 level of significance 

or better. 

19 
Table 6
 

Indexes of Leisure Activities by Stage in Model
 

I II III IV V VI 

Dis- Positive 

Activity interested Interested Trial Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Out-of-home, individual 

Out-of-home, family 

Creative 

1.98 

1.24 

.61 

2.94t 

2.33t 

1.03t 

3.38t 

2.73t 

1.20 

3.54 

3.02 

1.22 

3.72 

3.19 

1.64t 

4.06 

3.81t 

1.61 

In-home 2.38 3.40t 3.66t 3.89t 3.88 4.13 

Backstage .01 .02t .06t .07 .10 .13 

activities 6.69 10.32t 11.62t 12.23 13.06 14.15’ 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or
 

better.
 

*Significantly different from the preceding stage at the .10 level of significance or
 

better.
 

Tables 5 and 6 share the pattern found in earlier findings in that the level 

of activity in all categories is higher at Stage II than at Stage I. On the other 

hand, the pattern of differences across the other five stages varies considerably across the 30 activity categories reported in Table 5. 

In three cases, there are no clear conclusions that can be drawn because 

there are too few participants in Stages II through VI to permit statistically 

valid conclusions: working backstage at jazz or classical performances, 

playing a musical instrument, and acting, singing or dancing. In the remaining 27 categories, three patterns appear: 

In seven cases there are some statistically significant differences in 

selected transitions, but the overall pattern appears to be one where there 

are not major differences across the five stages. These seven activities 

are: 

 ̄ visiting amusement parks, 

 ̄ doing crafts,
 

 ̄ doing needlecrafts,
 

 ̄ playing games at home,
 

 ̄ reading books or magazines,
 

 ̄ repairing home or vehicles, and
 

 ̄ gardening.
 

2O 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

Six of the seven activities are usually carried out around the home, and 

in five cases they are done alone. 

o In three cases there is a significant increase between Stage II and Stage

VI. However, the increase appears to be gradual. These three categories 

are: 

 ̄ going to sporting events, 

 ̄ visiting science museums, and


 ̄
 doing photography. 

o In the remaining 16 categories there are increases between Stage II and 

Stage VI. However, the stage at which respondents demonstrate a 

marked increase in commitment to the activity varies considerably. 

There are ten cases in which there is a significant increase in activity at 

the Trial Stage (Stage III). These are: 

 ̄ going to the movies,


 ̄
 camping and hiking,


 ̄
 playing sports,


 ̄
 doing charity work,


 ̄
 visiting art museums,
 

 ̄ visiting historic sites,


 ̄
 visiting art fairs,
 

 ̄ collecting stamps and coins,
 

 ̄ gardening, and
 

 ̄ working backstage at musicals, plays, opera or the ballet.
 

It should be noted that eight out of these ten categories involve getting 

out of the home and doing something active. It would appear that moving 

to the trial stage is strongly associated with a willingness to spend leisure 

time out of the home. Since those in Stage III have attended only one 

event in an arts category in the previous year and have not expressed an 

interest in greater attendance, the performing arts may play a relatively 

minor role in these activities. Those in Stage III are outgoing, and one of 

the things they do when going out is attend the performing arts. 

There are seven cases where activity increases at Stage IV (Positive
 

Evaluation), the stage at which consumers have tried the arts and are
 

interested in attending more. These activities are:
 

 ̄ exercising and jogging,


 ̄
 visiting zoos, 

21 
Alan R. Andreasen 

 ̄ reading or listening to poetry,
 

 ̄ playing games at home,
 

 ̄ reading books or magazines,
 

 ̄ reading novels or poetry, and
 

 ̄ cooking gourmet meals.
 

Five of these activities are clearly home-centered, and exercising/jogging may also be done at home. This raises the possibility that those who 

have tried the arts and want to attend more often are held back because 

their home-centered life-styles have "forced" them to. The most obvious 

reason for this would be the presence of children at home. 

Six activities appear to increase at Stage V (Adoption), the point at 

which consumers begin to go to the performing arts relatively frequently 

but express no interest in going more often. The six activities are: 

 ̄ doing charity work,
 

 ̄ painting or sculpting,
 

 ̄ writing poems or stories,
 

 ̄ taking arts classes,
 

 ̄ reading or listening to poetry, and
 

 ̄ repairing home or vehicles.
 

Four of these activities reflect a commitment to arts activities done 

alone. It may be that those who have reached this stage have, in effect, 

fashioned a life-style that encompasses a multifaceted active arts life of 

which attendance at multiple events is simply one part. 

At Stage VI (Confirmation), five activities significantly increase. 

These are: 

 ̄ visiting art museums,
 

 ̄ visiting historic sites,
 

 ̄ visiting art fairs,
 

 ̄ visiting zoos, and
 

 ̄ reading novels and poetry.
 

The first four of these are family-oriented activities. This last stage 

apparently includes two kinds of people: those who are generally excited 

about the arts and those whose expressed desire to attend more often is 

simply a reflection of that excitement, and those whose desire to attend 

more may be an expression of frustration that other things in their lives 

(e.g. family commitments) may be keeping them from doing so. If this 

22 
 

Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

is the case, only the former can be tapped by the arts community for 

increased attendance. 

The summary indexes of activities reported in Table 6 clearly illustrate 

the above patterns. The Trial stage reflects increased activity more or less 

across the board. The stage of Positive Evaluation shows an increase in 

in-home activities; Adoption, an increase in creative activities; and Confirmation, an increase in out-of-home, family activities. These broader indexes 

appear to add little to the richness provided by the individual-level analysis. 

Work and Television Viewing 

It might be hypothesized that work and television viewing would compete 

with attendance at the performing arts. The more one works, the less time one 

would have for any kind of leisure activity, including attending the performing 

arts. In addition, the more one watched television, the less one is likely to be 

found at the performing arts, not because television viewing keeps one from 

the arts but because it may be preferred to attending live performances. 

Data in Table 7 indicate that neither hypothesis is consistently true. There 

is a significant dift’erence between respondents in Stage I and Stage II in 

whether they work. However, contrary to the hypothesis, those interested in 

attending the performing arts are more likely to be working than those who 

are not. Further, among those who do work, those at Stage I work fewer hours 

than those at Stage II. As we have seen throughout these data, those not 

Table 7 

Employment Characteristics by Stage in Model 

I II Ill IV V 

Employment Characteristic 

Dis. 

interested Interested Trial 

Positive 

Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Percent employed 

Hours worked per week 

Percent in professional/ 

52.4% 

38.0 

66.5%t 

39.8t 

64.5% 

36.6t 

67.7% 

36.2 

65.3% 

37.8 

67.7% 

39.1 

managerial occupations 10.2% 22.6%t 24.4% 29.6% 32.7% 42.5% 

TV hours per day 3.80 3.18 3.21 3.11 4.11 3.17 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or 

better. 

23 
Alan R. Andreasen 

attending and disinterested in the arts have markedly different life-styles in 

both their leisure and work pursuits. It may be fair to say that their most 

overwhelming trait is that they are simply less active in most dimensions of 

their lives. They do less, including working and attending the arts. Encouraging them to attend would not be merely a matter of changing the kinds of 

activities in which they engage, but of changing their overall level of activity. 

There is a decline in work hours between Stages II and III that would be 

consistent with the hypothesis that those attending are more likely to do so 

because they have the time. On the other hand, it may be noted that by Stage 

VI, the average number of work-hours of those who do work has approached 

the levels of those in Stage II. 

Table 7 also shows that as one moves through the performing arts 

adoption process, consumers are increasingly likely to be in managerial, or 

professional occupations. 

With respect to watching television, Table 7 reveals no significant 

differences across groups. Those in the disinterested group (Stage I) do watch 

about 20 percent more television than four of the five remaining groups. Only 

the Stage V group exceeds their level of viewing. 

Age and the Family Life Cycle 

Data in Table 8 on mean age for each stage of the performing arts 

adoption process show that those with the least interest in the arts are the 

oldest. One striking age pattern in the data is the finding that those conte~,ted 

with their present status (Stages I, III, and V) are older than those expressing 

interest in attending more (Stages II, IV, and VI). This suggests that those 

who are older (even when they are current attenders) lnay not be particularly 

good prospects for programs intended to increase attendance. 

Of course, as social scientists have noted for some time, age may not best 

describe an individual’s progress through life. A richer conception, the 

family life cycle,~s incorporates age with marital status and the presence or 

absence of children to yield a set of "normal" life stages. The six stages and 

their relationship to the perforlning arts adoption process are indicated in 

Table 8. 

The results confirm the speculation that those over 65 (married or living 

alone) are ~nuch less likely to be interested in attending the performing arts 

more often. 

Does the presence of children make a difference? Three competing 

hypotheses may be offered: 

24 
 

Table 8
 

Stage in the Family Life Cycle by Stage
 

in Performing Arts Adoption Model
 

I II ill IV V VI 

Dis. Positive 

Characteristic interested Interested Trial Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Mean age 46.0 38.5t 43.1 40.8 44.8t 41.2 

Family Life Cycle 

Young single 9.0% 

Young, married, no children 5.1% 

Infants at home 17.6% 

14.3% 

8.6%t 

24.5%f 

15.1% 

4.1%t 

12.8%t 

10.7% 

10.4%t 

19.5% 

17.3% 

4.1%t 

21.2% 

16.8% 

6.2% 

13.3% 

Children 6 plus 20.7% 21.9% 23.8% 21.8% 17.3% 23.0% 

Older, no children 26.6% 22.5%t 27.9%t 26.4% 31.6% 33.2% 

Elderly 20.8% 7.4%t 14.5%t 10.4% 17.3%* 7.5% 

Not categorized .2% .8% 1.8% .8% .2% 0% 

100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 

Mean Household size 3.04 3.11~ 2.90 2.95 2.64 2.72 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or
 

better.
 

*Significantly different from the preceding stage at the .10 level of significance or
 

better.
 

 ̄	 The presence of children decreases attendance but not interest because children impose increased costs if they are taken along or if 

babysitters are needed or because scheduling a time to actually get 

away to live performances is more difficult;

 ̄ The presence of children decreases arts attendance and interest 

because children cause a shift in priorities (i.e. more attention devoted 

to the work of childrearing) or because the children impose their own 

values on how the family spends its leisure time;

 ̄	 The presence of children i,zcreases arts attendance because adults 

interested in the arts make extra efforts to expose their children 

(perhaps as they were) to the performing arts. 

The data in Table 8 suggest that both the first and second hypotheses may 

have merit. First, it may be noted that those who are young and single or just 

married with no children are much more likely not to be in the disinterested 

group. Two thirds of both groups have progressed beyond Stage I to develop 

25 
Alan R. Andreasen 

at least some interest in the arts. Further, married individuals are more likely 

to have attended an arts performance and expressed an interest in attending 

more (Stage IV). 

With the appearance of young children, there is a substantial increase in 

those reporting themselves "disinterested." (This is not a function of aging 

since the two groups with children at home are not defined as either young 

or older.) With children under six years at home, we find that only one-quarter 

of the respondents have attended even one art performance, although 29.5 

percent would like to. Of the respondents with older children, 31.8 percent 

have not only expressed interest, but have actually attended a performance. 

This trend continues to the point where the respondents are older and the 

children are gone. Here we see that 34 percent have attended in the last year. 

More significantly perhaps, the proportion having attended several times 

rises simultaneously. 

The effect of the life cycle is perhaps best seen by looking at the 

proportions at each life-cycle stage who are at Stages V or VI: 

Young, single 17.9%
 

Young, married, no children 10.7%
 

Children under six at home 8.7%
 

Children six or older 12.4%
 

Older, no children 15.4%
 

Elderly 8.8%
 

Here we can see again that the elderly are clearly less active. But during 

the rest of the family life cycle, the relationship appears to be curvilinear. 

Those who are either young and single or older and with no children are those 

most likely to attend multiple events. Next most likely are those married with 

no children or married with children over six. Least likely to attend multiple 

events are those with children under six. The conclusion that young children 

at home inhibit rather than motivate involvement in the arts seems highly 

plausible. 

Finally, the data on average household size indicates relatively little 

difference across the various stages, with the slightly larger household size 

in Stage II consistent with the explanation above. 

Socioeconomic and Background Characteristics 

We have already analyzed several important socioeconomic characteristics including age, occupation, education and the family life cycle. There 

are several additional measures available in the Survey of Public Participa26 
 

Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

tion in the Arts that, according to other hypotheses, may be related to 

attendance and interest. These are race, ethnicity, gender, residence, and 

income. As indicated in Table 9, we do not find any statistically significant 

effects across the stages of the performing arts adoption process related to 

race and ethnicity. In part, this is a function of the small sample sizes.19 

Gender, however, exhibits a curious pattern. Unlike most other variables 

in this study, there is no difference between the disinterested/non-attending 

group (Stage I) and the rest of the sample. Further, as Table 9 indicates, there 

are no differences in the proportion of females in Stages I, II, III, and V. 

However, the table does indicate that those in Stages IV and VI are significantly more likely to be female. Both of these stages represent cases where 

respondents want to attend more performances but perceive barriers to doing 

so. As we shall outline below, there are important differences in the kinds of 

barriers men and women perceive to attending more arts performances. 

Residence. Just as gender affects whether one is interested in attending the 

performing arts more, so does whether one lives in a Standard Metropolitan 

Statistical Area (SMSA).20 As noted in Table 9, residence in an SMSA 

affects interest in attending more performances at all three stages, II, IV, and 

VI. The most obvious explanation suggested by this finding is that a "penalty" of living in an SMSA for those who have developed some interest in 

Table 9
 

Selected Socioeconomic Characteristics
 

by Stage in Model
 

I II III IV V VI 

Dis- Positive 

Characteristic interested Interested Trial Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Female 52.3% 53.7% 52.9% 62.5%t 49.0%t 64.6%t 

Black 11.0% 9.2% 4.7% 8.1% 6.1% 8.0% 

Hispanic 6.1% 5.0% 3.5% 3.6% 4.1% 1.8% 

In SMSA 56.6% 76.3%t 59.3% 83.1%1 56.1%t 85.8%$ 

Income overS30,000 16.5% 33.2%t 30.8% 40.1%t 38.8% 41.2% 

Mean family income $21,364 $27,134t $26,457 $30,122t $30,660 $31,502 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage atthe .05 level of significance or
 

better.
 

*Significantly different from the preceding stage atthe .10 level of significance or
 better.
 

27 
Alan R. Andreasen 

attending the performing arts is that one is exposed to a great deal of 

opportunity. Those already attending either one (Stage III) or many (Stage 

V) arts events are as likely to be from an SMSA as are those who profess 

interest in the arts but did not attend in the previous year. It appears that living 

in an SMSA has a perverse effect: It does not make one any more likely to 

be an active arts attender, but it probably makes one much more likely to 

want to attend more. 

Income. It has often been suggested that the performing arts are the playground for the well-to-do. We have already noted (Table 4) that education 

increases systematically through the stages of the performing arts adoption 

process. We have also seen in Table 7 that there is a slow increase in the 

proportion of respondents in managerial or professional occupations up 

through Stage VI. 

The effects of income, however, are different. When we observe either 

mean family income or the proportion of households with income over 

$30,000, we see two points of change in Table 9. As expected, the disinterested (Stage I) have significantly lower incomes than those with any involvement with the performing arts. There is little difference between Stages II 

and III, but a jump occurs as one moves from merely trying the performing 

arts to being interested in becoming a more active arts consumer. This would 

suggest that a necessary precondition for moving to the stage where one 

wishes to attend multiple performances may be a reasonable level of discretionary income. The increasing importance of income occurs at the positive 

evaluation stage, and after that stage there is little difference in average 

income or in the proportion of those who have incomes over $30,000. 

Barriers 

To this point we have investigated primarily personal or family attributes 

associated with progress from stage to stage of the performing arts adoption 

process. Because of the nature of the database, we have had to infer the likely 

factors that may be causing or inhibiting progress. However, one question in 

the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts directly addresses this issue. 

At three of the stages of the performing arts adoption process, individuals 

reported an interest in moving on to the next stage (i.e. attending more’,). In 

each case they were asked what barriers kept them from moving forward. 

Their own explanations were categorized in the SPPA under 16 headings, 

three of which we have excluded from this analysis: art form unavailable, 

respondent handicapped, or respondent ill or infirm. Barriers reported in five 

28 
 

 

Table 10
 

Percentage Citing Barriers to Attending
 

More Performing Arts by Gender, Residence
 

and Family Life Cycle
 

Barrier Cited: 

Characteristic Cost Travel Time Personal Motivation 

Non-SMSA 33.9%t 36.7%t 36.7%t 18.1% 11.3% 

SMSA 41.5% 17.7% 49.2% 22.6% 15.3% 

Male 38.2% 19.0% 54.2%t 11.0%t 16.4% 

Female 41.3% 23.3% 41.3% 29.3% 13.1% 

Young, no children 38.0%t 20.4% 54.4% 10.4%t 16.0% 

Children at home 47.9% 20.1% 47.9% 27.6% 12.1% 

Older, no children 31.2% 24.1% 37.0% 22.0% 16.4% 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or 

better. 

key categories representing 88 percent of all barriers mentioned are reported 

in Table 10. The five categories are cost, problems associated with travel (i.e. 

too far to go or transportation, traffic, or parking problems), time, other 

personal reasons (i.e. "would feel uncomfortable," "don’t have anyone to go 

with," babysitter problem/must care for children, or crime or fear of crime), 

and lack of motivation. 

Analysis of these perceived barriers revealed very little. Whether one has 

not attended in the last year, attended once, or attended more than once has 

no relationship to whether one mentions travel, time, other personal reasons, 

or lack of motivation for not going more. In only one case does a difference 

appear. Those who did not attend during the previous year were less likely 

to mention cost as a reason. The most plausible explanation for this may be 

that those who have not attended simply do not have much knowledge of 

costs at this stage. The finding would certainly imply that arts managers 

seeking to attract those who have not recently attended may not have to worry 

as much about addressing the cost problem. 

Although only one difference in barriers is mentioned across stages in 

the performing arts adoption process, there are differences related to residence, gender and family life-cycle. The relevant data are presented in Table 

10, which shows patterns that are quite plausible. Those in SMSAs are much 

29 
Alan R. Andreasen 

more likely to mention cost and less likely to see., travel as a problem. They 

also mention not having enough time, which would be consistent with our 

speculation that life in the "big city" is rife with opportunity for an active 

life-style, of which the performing arts are but one part. 

With respect to gender, men are somewhat more likely to mention not 

having enough time, while women are significantly more likely to mention 

personal reasons for not attending. When the latter is broken down into its 

components, we find that women are somewhat more likely to cite fear of 

crime, babysitter problems, or lack of someone to go with when asked 

identical questions about barriers to attendance. 

The findings with respect to the family life cycle are intriguing. Those 

with children are much more likely to mention cost, presumably because 

going to performances represents a much greater total outlay either for 

multiple tickets or for babysitting costs. With respect to time, the major 

difference is that the elderly less often complain about not having enough 

time. Those who are younger with no children probably have time problems 

because of an active life-style, while those with children may feel more 

family time pressures. 

The finding of differences due to personal concerns masks diversity 

among the family life-cycle groups. Those who are young without children 

rarely mention these problems. They seldom lack dates, they don’t need 

babysitters, and they don’t worry about crime or feeling uncomfortable. 

Those with children, especially those with children under six, mention 

babysitting problems, while those who are older and have no children are 

much more likely to mention fear of crime or the fact that they have no one 

to go with. 

Several of these findings support our earlier speculation that arts participation is curvilinear with respect to the family life cycle because the 

presence of children imposes both financial burdens and other responsibilities on these households. 

Arts Attended and Arts Sought 

To this point we have been treating the six categories of performing arts 

as interchangeable. Examining the particular art form currently attended and 

those forms sought out for future attendance provides further insight into the 

characteristics of those at each stage of the performing arts adoption process. 

Relevant data on current attendance are presented in Tables 11 and 12. 

Table 11 reports the proportion of those in Stages IiI through VI attending 

each performing art. Table 12 then reports attendance in terms of what 

3O 
Table 11
 

Percentage Attending Performing Arts
 

by Stage in Model
 

III IV V 

Positive 

Performing Art THai Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Jazz 27.3% 20.5% 46.9% 43.8% 

Classical music 18.6% 25.4% 50.0% 54.4% 

Opera 2.3% 2.0% 14.3% 10.2% 

Musical plays 47.7% 55.4% 64.3% 72.1% 

Plays 25.6% 26.1% 40.8% 52.2% 

Ballet 2.3% 4.9% 17.3% 24.8% 

Total events attended (number) (213) (412) (229) (582) 

marketers call "market share." The latter controls for the fact that those in 

Stages V and VI attend many events while those in Stages !II and IV attend 

only one or two. Table 12, therefore, reports the percentage each category 

represents of all categories mentioned by the group in the stage. Thus, for 

example, Table 11 shows that 27.3 percent of those in the Trial Stage (Stage 

III) attended jazz performances, while Table 12 shows that jazz events 

represent 22.1 percent of all events attended by those at this stage.21 

As expected, those who attend multiple events show increases in absolute 

levels of attendance in all six categories. Obviously, those in Stages V and 

VI are better targets for each of the performing arts than those in Stages III 

and IV. However, Table 12 shows a subtle shifting of relative emphasis 

among categories. There is little difference across the four stages for attendance at classical music performances. Those at the trial stage are relatively 

more likely to patronize jazz or plays. By contrast, those attending multiple 

events (Stages V and VI) are relatively more likely to attend ballet and opera. 

Table 13 confirms two patterns among those who wish to attend more 

often. Those at the "interest" stage mention many fewer categories (although 

they could have mentioned all six) than those attending multiple events. This 

clearly confirms the assumption that movement along the performing arts 

adoption process represents deepening involvement in the arts. On the other 

hand, Table 13 does not show equal increase in interest in all categories. 

There is virtually no deepening of interest in jazz attendance across the three 

categories. There is an increase in the other five categories from those who 

didn’t attend last year (Stage II) and those who attend only one event (Stage 

IV). However, of those who have attended several events, there is no change 

31 
Table 12
 

"Market Share" for Each Performing Art
 

by Stage in Model
 

Ill IV V VI 

Positive 

Performing Art Tdal Evaluation Adoption Confirmation 

Jazz 22.1% 15.3% 20.1% 17.0% 

Classical music 15.0% 18.9% 21.4% 21.1% 

Opera 1.9% 1.5% 6.1% 4.0% 

Musical plays 38.5% 41.3% 27.5% 28.0% 

Plays 20.7% 19.4% 17.5% 20.3% 

Ballet 1.9% 3.6% 7.4% 9.6% 

Total 100.1% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 

Total events attended (213) (412) (229) (582) 

in interest in attending more stage plays, and a decline of interest in attending 

musical plays. Greater interest, however, is shown for the more "serious" art 

forms (classical music, opera, and ballet). In general, the patterns in Tables 

11, 12 and 13 show a correlation between increased attendance and increased 

interest in more serious art, a finding that validates the basic model. 

Summary 

A review of the analyses of individual variables and indexes in the 

preceding sections indicates that in every case except one there were significant differences between those individuals not attending and not interested in the arts (Stage I) and those who have a beginning interest in the arts 

(Stage II). The one exception is being in a family with children over six years 

old. The latter is one of three measures where there are no major changes 

across all six stages. The other two are race and ethnicity, where the lack of 

significant effects across all six stages is probably due to small sample sizes. 

If one looks only at the four transitions beyond the first two stages, there 

are six variables where there are virtually no differences across the remaining 

stages. These measures are all life-style activities: 

 ̄ visiting amusement parks, 

 ̄ doing crafts, 

 ̄ sewing and knitting, 

32 
Table 13
 

Performing Arts Sought by Those
 Wanting to Attend More by Stage in Model
 

II IV 

Positive 

Performing Art Interest Evaluation Confirmation 

Jazz 31.3% 29.0% 29.6% 

Classical music 24.4% 31.9%t 42.9% 

Opera 10.9% 12.1% 18.1% 

Musical plays 51.3% 71.7%t 56.6%t 

Plays 36.6% 50.2%t 50.0% 

Ballet 14.0% 19.2%t 28.3%t 

tSignificantly different from the preceding stage at the .05 level of significance or 

better. 

 ̄ working backstage at a jazz or classical music performance,

 ̄ acting, singing, or dancing, and 

 ̄ playing a musical instrument. 

The lack of differences for the last two measures is in part due to small sample 

sizes. 

Of the remaining measures, eight show no significant differences between any two stages, but do show a systematic increase stage-by-stage over 

the five stages. These measures are: 

 ̄ number of years of education, 

 ̄ having attended college, 

 ̄ being aprofessional or manager,

 ̄ total consumption of the arts through other media, 

 ̄ going to sports events, 

 ̄ visiting science museums, and 

 ̄ doing photography. 

Many of the remaining variables also rise as one moves from Stage II to Stage 

VI. However, there are occasions where there are spurts or lags at certain 

stages that create significant differences between stages. This generally 

describes all of the remaining life-style measures and most of the other 

socialization, media, and socioeconomic measures. There are three cases, 

33 
Alan R. Andreasen 

however, in which the patterns involve oscillations. These are: (a) SMSA, 

where those interested in greater attendance (Stages II, IV and VI) are more 

often found in SMSAs than those who are content with their present level of 

attendance (Stages I, III, and V); (b) gender, where females are more likely 

to be interested in attending more multiple events (Stages IV and VI) and 

men are more content with their level of attendance (Stages III and V); and 

(c) the elderly who were more likely to be content with their present levels
 

of attendance (Stages III and V) than wanting more (Stages IV and VI).
 

Discriminant Analysis 

To this point, our analysis has identified and provided preliminary 

validation for the model of the performing arts adoption process, uncovered 

a number of dramatic differences across stages, and identified factors that 

appear to be related to transitions between the stages. Except for the occasional use of indexes the analysis has considered each of the major sets of 

variables in the SPPA study separately. 

However, many of the variables are related to each other. This would 

include both traditional socioeconomic correlations such as occupation and 

education, and also many of the life-style measurements specific to this study. 

Many of the factors shown to be significant may only be so because they are 

associated with other variables. It is important, therefore, to investigate the 

proposed performing arts adoption process model considering the variables 

simultaneously. 

Since our primary interest is in understanding movement through the 

performing arts adoption process, the questions we need to answer are the 

following: 

1. At each stage of the process, which set of variables in combination best 

distinguishes those at this stage from those at the immediately preceding 

stage? 

2. What is the relative importance of each of the variables in the final set? 

3. How successful is the entire set of variables in separating those at one 

stage from those at the earlier stage? 

The appropriate technique for this task is the two-group discriminant 

analysis which has had a relatively long history in social science and 

marketing research. The approach uses the technique analytically to find the 

linear combination of candidate discriminator variables that best separates a 

34 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

given population into two groups where group membership is already known. 

A typical application in marketing would be to identify the key distinguishing 

characteristics of those who buy a firm’s brand or patronize a firm’s outlet 

or service from those who do not.22 It has also been used to separate buyers 

and nonbuyers of new products.23 Where there are more than two groups 

involved, it is also possible to extend two-group discriminant analysis to a 

multiple-group case.24 

In the present analysis, discriminant analysis is employed to learn which 

combination of variables best separates respondents at each transition point 

in the performing arts adoption process.* 

As expected from the results of other studies, several of the variables 

found to be significant in the bivariate analyses (analyses using only two 

variables) were not significant in the discriminant analysis when their interactions with other variables were considered. Still others showed reversals 

of signs suggesting that real relationships may be obscured in the bivariate 

analyses by the presence of hidden third or fourth variables. 

In the five discriminant equations, a number of patterns emerged. First, 

the single most important discriminating variable is place of residence, which 

appeared in all five equations and typically carried the heaviest weight. It is 

clear that living in a major metropolitan area creates a strong interest in 

attending more performing arts events, even among those who haven’t 

attended in the past year. 

Second, life-style factors appear in all of the equations. And, while the 

specific factors differ by equation, they are almost always life-style activities 

that involve considerable effort and activity and take place outside the home. 

Interpretation of each of the last four equations in light of the variables 

also found significant in the bivariate analysis is as follows: 

Trial. With other variables held constant, moving to the trial stage is 

not associated with parental encouragement in the arts as a child, but 

is positively associated with attending college. Those moving to the 

trial stage are likely to be older, not recently married or not with 

children under six. Having children under six clearly inhibits actual 

attendance, even at a first event. Those who move to the trial stage 

and show no interest in moving farther are likely to engage in other 

activities such as visiting museums, hiking or camping, or going to 

* The full set of predictor variables is listed in Appendix A. In general, the candidate 

set of variables was as disaggregated as possible. Thus, for example, the set 

includes the individual life-style activities rather than summary indexes. 

35 
Alan R. Andreasen 

the movies. They also balance their arts attendance with working 

backstage at plays and painting and sculpting on their own. 

Positive Evaluation. Developing an interest in increased arts attendance after a trial appears to be a matter of both motivation and 

inhibition. Parental encouragement and living in an SMSA lead one 

to want more attendance, and having an income over $30,000 apparently helps provide the means for getting more deeply involved. 

However, being newly married or having children under six apparently discourages attendance at multiple events (Stage IV). As a 

consequence, this group listens to records and tapes and visits historical sites, presumably with young children. Home life apparently 

permits less painting, sculpture, or crafts, and encourages board 

games. People at this stage also keep up their interest in the arts by 

attending adult arts classes. 

Adoption. Moving on to attend multiple events is again associated 

with parental encouragement and with going to art museums and 

painting and sculpting, but not with visiting historical sites or exercising or jogging. Adoption is more likely to be associated with 

charitable work and not associated with being female. Females are 

more likely to want to move beyond present attendance levels, but 

are inhibited by other obligations.25 Movement to the adoption stage 

is also associated with a greater interest in arts on the radio and less 

interest in arts on records or tapes. 

Confirmation. Movement beyond multiple attendance to wanting 

more involvement is again a function of motivators and inhibitors. 

Childhood socialization is again important, in this case in the form 

of early arts classes in school rather than parental encouragement. As 

in the previous transition, life-cycle factors are no longer significant 

(although we know that the elderly in general are not interested in 

increased arts activity). Movement to the confirmation stage is associated with a decline in attending art classes and an increase (again) 

in visiting historical sites and exercising or jogging. Of more significance is the fact that women are more likely than men, and SMSA 

residents more likely than non-SMSA residents, to have a long term 

commitment to the arts. 

36 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

IV: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 

The preceding bivariate and multivariate analyses constitute an exploratory investigation of a new model outlining six steps through which an 

individual progresses from being a disinterested non-attender at the performing arts to being an attender at multiple events who wants to attend more. 

This model is responsive to the needs of performing arts managers who wish 

to expand their audiences, but who recognize that active intervention must 

be based on a clear understanding of the underlying process to be influenced. 

Audiences differ in "where they are" with respect to attending the performing 

arts, and marketers must realize that it is an incremental process. 

The research reported above appears to offer strong support for the model 

both as a way of describing the process of becoming involved in arts 

patronage and as a source of insights into the factors that encourage or inhibit 

movement through the process. The model of the performing arts adoption 

process not only has face validity, but also predictive and explanatory power. 

The bivariate analysis indicates that movement along the stages is clearly 

associated with factors such as education, occupation, life-style, and early 

childhood socialization, found to be important in other studies. Movement 

from one stage to another is characterized by more involvement and by 

deeper involvement in the sense of greater interest and more attendance. 

The strongest differences in the entire process are between the first two 

stages. Those who express no interest in the arts are dramatically different 

from those who have even the most minimal interest. More importantly, these 

differences are so pronounced that people at Stage I should, from an efficiency standpoint, be given very low priority in future audience development 

programs. Their socioeconomic characteristics are just not like those at any 

other stage in the process. Furthermore, they are simply less active in all 

pursuits, including work. Thus encouraging their interest in the arts would 

be not only a matter of changing their activities, but changing their inactive 

life-style. This would seem a formidable, if not an impossible task. 

This study found that movement from Stage II to Stage VI is probably 

influenced by the following socioeconomic variables: 

Early childhood socialization whether through parental encouragement or art classes is strongly associated with movement along the 

performing arts adoption process.26 However, the discriminant analysis suggests that the influence of this variable may not come about 

until after the adoption stage. 

37 
Alan R. Andreasen 

Residence in a Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area presents more 

opportunities to participate in the arts and presumably leads to a 

stronger desire to attend more performing arts no matter what one’s 

present level of attendance. At the same time, while an SMSA reduces 

travel problems as a barrier to greater attendance, it increases economic costs and apparently offers so many other opportunities (and 

perhaps a more hectic life-style) that SMSA residents complain more 

often of not having enough time to attend more. 

One’s stage in the performing arts adoption process is associated 

with one’s stage in the family life cycle. The elderly are less likely 

to attend multiple events and more content with their present level 

of attendance, whatever it is. Attendance at multiple events is 

greatest by those who are young and single and those who are older 

and have no children living at home. It seems probable that the 

presence of children under six strongly inhibits movement through 

the stages. 

According to the discriminant analysis, and contrary to other studies, 

discretionary income is not uniformly associated with movement 

along the process. It sets those interested (Stage II) apart from those 

who are not (Stage I), probably because it is associated with at least 

a minimal interest in the arts. Beyond that point, income only appears 

to be an important discriminator at Stage IV. One apparently has to 

have at least a minimum amount of discretionary income to be 

interested in attending multiple events. 

As other studies have shown, measures of life-style provide useful 

insights into movement across various stages of the process. However, in contrast to the earlier studies, we found that, once other 

factors are controlled, only those life-style activities involving active 

commitments of time and effort away from home appear to offer 

consis{ent explanatory power: People who seldom leave home during 

their leisure time are unlikely to increase attendance at live performances. The multivariate analysis shows that these activities appear 

most strongly at the Trial stage where a passive interest in the arts is 

first associated with active effort to actually get out of the house and 

go to a performance. 

At the stages of the process where individuals may perceive barriers 

38 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

to increased attendance, there were three major findings. First, with 

one exception, we found no major differences in barriers whether one 

has never attended, attended one or two times, or attended multiple 

events. The one exception was that cost was less important to those 

who had not attended in the last year. Second, cost seems less an 

inhibitor for those early in the process than one might have assumed. 

Finally, we found that the types of barriers one mentioned were 

related to SMSA (as noted above), gender, and family life cycle, 

although in ways that were quite predictable (e.g. those with young 

children complained about babysitting problems). 

Other uses of time such as working or watching television appeared 

not to inhibit arts attendance, nor did consuming arts on other media 

reduce attendance. On the contrary, consumption of art through other 

media appeared to become important when respondents had gone 

beyond the trial stage, had positively evaluated a live performance, 

and wanted to attend more. 

Finally, with respect to methodology, the bivariate analyses identified 

some variables that appeared to be associated with movement along the 

process, but were subsequently found not to be significant or to have a 

different effect when other factors with which they were correlated were 

introduced. Clearly, bivariate analyses should be approached with caution if 

they are not accompanied by the application of more powerful techniques 

such as discriminate analysis. 

Recommendations for Performing Arts Managers 

We have provided strong support in the preceding sections for the 

performing arts adoption process as a valid descriptive and explanatory 

model of the sequence of steps through which consumers pass in their 

progress from disinterest to active involvement in the live performing arts. 

The model must still be considered exploratory, but it seems reasonable to 

argue that it is useful to both theorists and researchers. A final test for the 

model is whether it is useful to performing arts managers. This audience is, 

in fact, the one whose development problems motivated the present study. 

We propose the following as reasonable managerial insights based on the 

model itself and on the empirical investigation of target segments of the 

population defined by that model. 

39 
Alan R. Andreasen 

Insights from the Performing Arts Adoption Process Model 

Becoming a committed, performing arts attender requires progression through several stages of commitment and behavior. Transforming a presently disinterested nonattender into an enthusiastic patron 

of the arts is a gradual, one-step-at-a-time process. 

Transition from step to step varies in the challenge it presents. Getting 

interested for the first time presumably requires acquisition of much 

more information than is the case for those who tried the performing 

arts and need to be brought to the point where they attend more. 

Clearly, the marketing strategies that a manager uses for those at one 

stage must be different from those used at a different stage. 

Since the transitions facing a consumer at each of the first five stages 

of the model differ, it is reasonable to expect that the type of consumer 

one finds at each stage will differ (a major empirical finding of the 

analysis). This has further implications for the marketing strategies 

to be employed at each stage. 

Empirical Insights 

As noted, the results clearly indicate that consumers at each of the five 

stages of the model differ markedly in who they are and what their interests 

and backgrounds are. In this study, it was difficult to judge whether people 

at some stages were more ready to change than others--a major concern for 

managers. However, the empirical evidence clearly suggests that the gap 

between those at Stage I (Disinterest) and at Stage II (Interest) is more than 

a gap; it is a chasm. It seems quite clear that efforts to move the 47 percent 

of the market at Stage I to the next stage would be uneconomical and probably 

would have a very limited chance of success. 

Ways to influence the 53 percent of the population at the other five stages 

in the process are suggested by empirical data which describe those at each 

stage and the nature of the transitions between them. This allows managers to 

develop an effective segmentation strategy to address each stage separately. 

One approach is direct targeting. It involves clearly identifying those with 

traits that make them very likely to be prime candidates for making a 

particular transition and then focusing one’s resources on them. The second 

is self-selection. It involves contriving messages that speak directly to the 

particular segment and inducing them to think "Oh, yes, they’re speaking to 

4O 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

me. Let me hear what they have to say." Self-selection is more expensive 

than direct targeting in that it requires blanketing the market rather broadly 

in the hopes of catching many in the targeted group. It is also risky in that 

many who are not in the targeted group will be reached by the message and 

some may, in fact, be offended by it. 

To develop a basis for using either strategy, one must identify the traits 

that distinguish consumers at each transition point, and then emphasize the 

characteristics of those at the next stage to which one wishes those in the 

earlier stage to move. The assumption is that those in the earlier stage 

possessing these traits are the best candidates for moving on. The data, 

therefore, suggest the following segmentation approaches for each of the four 

major transitions: 

Inducing Trial 

Direct Targeting. Prime candidates would be those who: 

a. Are not on an arts organization’s subscription list but have indicated 

some interest (e.g. asking for a brochure, taking a guided tour, or 

stopping by an arts fair exhibit); 

b. Have worked backstage at a play or musical comedy; 

c. Have visited an art museum (i.e. are on their mailing list); 

d.	 Belong to some organized sports team or gym; 

e.	 Hike or camp (e.g. belong to a hiking club or visit specific recreational 

sites); 

f. Attend movies (perhaps of a particular type?); 

g. Are in an SMSA; 

h.	 Are alumni of colleges; 

i.	 Paint or sculpt (e.g. show at arts fairs, take classes, rent studios); 

j.	 (Possibly) Are involved in charities; 

k.	 (Possibly) Elderly (e.g. belong to Golden Years organizations). 

°	 Self-Selection. Messages directed to this segment should portray them
 

as having one or more of the traits just outlined. Further, they should not
 

be portrayed as young and married with no children or with children
 

under six. Messages that might "speak" to this audience could contain 

some or all of the following language: 

 ̄ "You’ve always been interested in the arts. Now that the kids are in 

school and your life is more settled, here is your chance..." 

41 
 

Alan R. Andreasen 

"There are certain people who are always on the go. They hike, they 

enjoy sports, they go to art museums. They’re curious and they like 

new experiences. For those of you who have always wanted to try 

the performing arts as part of your active life-style, here’s your 

chance..." 

Encouraging Positive Evaluation 

1. Direct Targeting. The obvious target groups would be those who: 

a.	 Are first-time attenders at any event; 

b.	 Purchase records or tapes of arts performances; 

c.	 Visit historic sites or zoos; 

d.	 Take art classes; 

e.	 Arein SMSAs. 

2.	 Self-Selection. Messages appealing to this group might contain some or 

all of the following: 

"This is often a child-centered time for many households. Times for 

taking the kids to a zoo or a historic site like . Or sometimes 

just to stay home and play board games and listen to your tapes or 

records. But remember the time when you went to the performing 

arts? Don’t you think that’s something you ought to try again-­

maybe after the kids are a little older? Or maybe it’s something to 

take the kids to now, just as your Mom and Dad took you. Now that 

you’ve got a little more money, don’t iyou think you owe it to 

yourself--and to them?" 

"We know you spend a lot of time at home, but you’re still a very 

active person. Don’t you think you should enjoy the live performing 

arts as a regular part of your active life-style?" 

At this stage, your objective is to get the target audience interested in 

attending more, not in actually doing so. 

Encouraging Adoption 

1. Direct Targeting. The groups to appeal to here are those who: 

42 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

a. Have attended a performing arts event recently and expressed an 

interest in attending more, perhaps by picking up a brochure at the 

site; 

b.	 Visited art museums; 

c.	 Are active in charitable work; 

d.	 Listen to some classical music radio stations; 

e.	 Are Black; 

f.	 Paint or sculpt; 

g.	 Are male. 

Self-Selection. Messages for this segment may be designed around the 

following themes: 

"For a long time you’ve been thinking about making the performing 

arts a permanent part of your active life-style. Here is your chance to 

subscribe to a package of great events." 

"Your parents were right. Making the performing arts a major part of 

your life is rewarding. Even for the busy person who thinks he or she 

can’t fit in another thing, the arts are a great diversion--something 

really different! They can stimulate, enrich, relax the most jaded and 

overworked person." 

"We know how exciting it is to live in a big city and to have so many 

choices. Maybe you’re a little frustrated that there is so much out 

there that you can’t do it all and just don’t know where to begin. 

Here’s our guide for those who want to ’Grow with the Arts’." 

Inducing Confirmation 

1. Direct Targeting. The targets here are those who: 

a.	 Are already subscribers to arts series or who can be found on multiple 

mailing or subscriber lists; 

b. Visit historical sites; 

c.	 Participate in exercise classes or health clubs; 

d.	 Are female; 

e.	 Are in SMSAs. 

43 
Alan R. Andreasen 

o Self-Selection. Messages for this group would either reinforce their 

existing attendance (e.g. subscription) behavior or encourage them to 

further broaden their experiences. A typical message might be: 

"As an active person and a serious patron of the arts, you know what 

an enriching experience the arts can be. It is something you will want 

to keep up for a lifetime. Remember, our city contains many resources 

in the performing arts. Here’ s a way you can continue to expand your 

involvement in the arts..." 

Although the data do not permit estimates of how much to allocate to 

each of these four transitions, two considerations should be kept in mind. 

First, the segments differ in size. Almost two-thirds of those beyond Stage I 

are in Stages II and IV where they have expressed positive interest in 

increased attendance. Second, the segments beyond Stage I probably differ 

in their susceptibility to efforts to move them to the next stage. It would seem 

logical to suppose that it is easier to get those in (the larger) Stages II and IV 

to translate their interest into action than to change those in Stages III and V 

who are satisfied with their level of attendance. 

If more resources are put into Stages iI and IV, further segmentation of 

those markets in terms of the barriers they face seems warranted. Thus, in 

addressing women, one should encourage them to come alone or should 

provide babysitting. In addressing those with children at home, one should 

stress cost savings by offering a family discount package. 

Although the data do not suggest it, an approach to moving people at one 

stage to the next could be to identify those at the later stage and have them 

~notivate their friends who are at an earlier stage. For example, one might 

contact subscribers and encourage them to interest a friend, perhaps by 

offering a discount coupon (or subscription brochure) and a $10.00 discount 

at a restaurant good only for a party of four. 

Finally, the role of early childhood socialization in the later stages of the 

process should be noted. This again emphasizes the value to the arts com­

~nunity generally of continued, substantial investments in programs in 

schools and elsewhere to encourage children to begin a lifetime involvement 

with the performing arts. 

These strategies allow managers to focus on targeted markets at particular 

stages and to inch them toward an extended commitment to attendance (and 

perhaps to other forms of financial and vocal support). In carrying out these 

strategies, managers need to develop systems to identify those at each stage 

44 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

and then to track their progression to subsequent stages over time. Such 

systems would allow knowledge to accrue on how to stimulate movement in 

particular markets and how the analysis here applies to different regions and 

art forms. 

Research Recommendations 

Although we believe the approach of this explanatory study is both valid 

and useful, much remains to be done to extend the validation, improve our 

understanding of the transitions, and increase the model’s managerial usefulness. The following are some of the research possibilities to explore in the 

near term. 

Clearly, the two most problematic aspects of the present study are that 

it is cross-sectional and based on secondary data. Several assumptions 

were necessary, particularly those assigning individual respondents to 

each stage of the performing arts adoption process. A replication of the 

present study with more careful questioning about respondents’ entire 

past performing arts behavior would be a valuable next step. 

Two alternative research approaches that could be used to measure 

changes in arts behavior year-to-year for the same consumers would be 

the following: 

A retrospective study would simply ask a cross-section of consumers 

about their current behavior and their behavior a year earlier. While 

such a design would be subject to memory and telescoping biases, 

gross measures (e.g. asking if they are now attending "more, less, or 

the same") can be trustworthy. 

A true panel would ask a fixed sample of individuals to report their 

current behavior at specified intervals (e.g. once a year). This design 

requires patience and can be expensive. It is also subject to biases due 

to sample "mortality" and pre-sensitization. However, it does yield 

relatively objective data on changes in behavior which can be tied to 

specific individuals. Further, costs can be kept within bounds by 

using lower-cost methods such as mail-back diaries after the first 

wave. 

45 
Alan R. Andreasen 

3.	 If and when a new study is undertaken, measures of the following would 

add important new insights: 

 ̄	 Attendance and interest in the performing arts on the part of other 

members of the household; 

 ̄	 Satisfaction with recent attendance (especially among those who 

have attended only one event in a category in the past year); 

Factors considered when deciding to attend a performance (to move 

from Stage II to Stage III) or to expand attendance to multiple events 

(to move from Stage IV to Stage V); 

 ̄ Magazines or newspapers read, radio stations listened to, television 

programs watched (to give guidance to future media strategies); 

Recent changes in life status such as divorce, job change, geographic 

relocation, or birth of a child (to indicate whether such changes 

precipitate changes in performing arts involvement). 

4.	 Other important assumptions or issues to be explored in future research 

are the following: 

Are the six art forms really substitutes for each other? Are there 

identifiable subsets that compete only with each other? Are there 

other going-out options that ought to be included as alternatives in 

future research designs (e.g. going to the movies or to an upscale 

restaurant)? 

In what ways are metropolitan areas different? Is the substantial array 

of alternatives there motivating or frustrating? Are the life-styles of 

arts attenders in major urban areas markedly different from the 

life-styles of arts attenders in non-SMSAs? 

Are there regional differences in the contribution of explanatory 

variables? Is cost more important in the South or Midwest? Is time 

pressure a greater problem on the East Coast? Are young people 

different in California? 

 ̄ Do individuals pass through all stages of the model, or do they leap 

46 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

across stages under certain circumstances? Under what conditions 

does this happen? 

Under what circumstances do consumers "regress" in the process? 

To what extent are family life-cycle factors important in this regard? 

What can arts organizations do to inhibit or prevent such regression? 

47
 
Alan R. Andreasen 

NOTES 

1. U.S. Bureau of the Census, StatisticaI Abstract of the United States 1986 

(Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1987), p. 236. 

Note that attendance at Broadway and regional theater declined in 1983 

and 1984 after growing more or less steadily since 1976. 

2. Paul DiMaggio, Michael Useem, and Paula Brown, Audience Studies of 

the Performing Arts and Museums. National Endowment for the Arts, 

Research Report #9 (Washington, D.C., 1977). 

3. Alan R. Andreasen, "Life Status Changes and Changes in Consumer 

Preferences and Satisfaction," Journal of Consumer Research 11:1 

(Spring 1984), pp. 784-794. 

4. Everett M. Rogers, Diffusion of Innovations (Glencoe, IL: The Free 

Press, 1983). This is the seminal work in the area. Also, Thomas S. 

Robertson, "Marketing’s Potential Contribution to Consumer Behavior 

Research: The Case of Diffusion Theory," in Thomas C. Kinnear, ed. 

Advances in Consumer Research, Vol. XI (Provo, Utah: Association for 

Consumer Research, 1984), pp. 484-489. 

5. John P. Robinson, Carol A. Keegan, Terry Hanford, and Timothy A. 

Triplett, Public Participation in the Arts: Final Report on the 1982 

Survey (Washington, D.C.: Research Division, National Endowment for 

the Arts, October 1985). Data from a similar 1985 study were not used 

in the present analysis since in the later study all of the measures used in 

this analysis were never collected at one time for one sample of respondents. 

6. As will be noted below, these assumptions deserve attention in future 

explorations of the present model. 

7. This assumption is well documented in the 1982 and 1985 SPPA studies. 

See Robinson, et al., Public Participation in the Arts. 

8. See Robinson et al., Public Participation in the Arts. 

9. See, for example, Alan R. Andreasen and Russell W. Belk, "Predictors 

of Attendance at the Performing Arts," Journal of Consumer Research 

7:2 (September 1980), pp. 112-120; Richard J. Orend, Socialization and 

Participation in the Arts. National Endowment for the Arts, Research 

Report #21 (Washington, D.C., 1989). 

10. William D. Wells, ed., Life Style and Psychographics (Chicago: American Marketing Association, 1973). The usual strategy in marketing 

research is to factor-analyze such measures in one of two ways: Either 

one seeks underlying dimensions that the sample as a whole appears to 

express in its answers, or one seeks to group individuals in terms of their 

48 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

11. 

12. 

AIO patterns. Both approaches were used by Belk and Andreasen in a 

1978 study for the National Endowment for the Arts (Andreasen and 

Belk, "Predictors of Attendance at the Performing Arts"). These authors 

analyzed leisure life-style data for a sample of respondents in four 

southern cities and classified six basic types, two of which--the culture 

patrons and social activists--were important consumers for symphony 

or theater. Psychographic analysis using the widely popular VALS 

life-style model developed by Arnold Mitchell (Arnold Mitchell, The 

Nine American Lifestyles [New York: MacMillan, 1983]) was used to 

help explain performing arts attendance in a study carried out for the 

Association of College, University and Community Arts Administrators, 

Inc. (The Professional Performing Arts." Attendance Patterns, Preferences and Motives, [Madison, WI.: Association of College, University and 

Community Arts Administrators, Inc., 1984]). This study found that 

those who were classified as "societally conscious" or "experientials" 

were by far the heaviest attenders in the total population. Although the 

"achiever" psychographic group bulks larger in the general population, 

the study predicts that the "societally conscious" will soon overtake them 

in total audience size. In the present study, it was not possible to use the 

psychographic segmentation approach developed in either of the other 

two studies. 

Robinson et al., Public Participation in the Arts. Robinson and his 

associates analyzed these data (with the exclusion of TV viewing and 

museum attendance) and drew the following major conclusions: 

a) Five factors appeared in the analysis. However, four of these factors 

had relatively small associations with key variables. 

b) All of the activities were positively associated with each other and 

that "one ’general activity’ factor seemed a more apt descriptor of the 

data than the five dinaensions that emerged from the analysis." 

Because of these conclusions, we decided not to begin with a reduced 

set of factors. A second reason for adopting this strategy is that, in the 

present investigation, our interest is in the stages of the performing arts 

adoption process. It is not clear that, even if some general factor structure 

for the entire sample could be developed, such a structure would be 

appropriate to the separate stages and transition points. 

Russell W. Belk and Alan R. Andreasen, "The Effects of Family Life 

Cycle on Arts Patronage," Journal of Cultural Economics, Vol.6, no. 2 

(December 1982), pp. 25-26. Belk and Andreasen found that attendance 

at symphony and theater in four southern cities declined when individuals were newly married and had children at home. 

49 
Alan R. Andreasen 

13.	 William D. Wells and George Gubar, "The Life Cycle Concept in
 

Marketing Research," Journal of Marketing Research 3 (November,
 

1966), pp. 355-363; E. Laird Landon and William B. Locander, "Family
 

Life Cycle and Leisure Behavior Research," in William L. Wilkie, ed.,
 

Advances in Consumer Research 6 (Ann Arbor, MI: Association for
 

Consumer Research, 1979), pp. 133-138.
 

14. DiMaggio and Useem, for example, point to the persistence of income 

and gender as predictors of arts attendance in a large number of studies. 

Paul DiMaggio, Michael Useem, and Paula Brown, Audience Studies of 

the Performing Arts and Museums: A Critical Review (Washington, 

D.C.: National Endowment for the Arts, 1978). 

15. Andreasen and Belk, "The Effects of Family Life Cycle." 

16. For a full description of barriers reported by respondents, see Robinson 

et al., Public Participation in the Arts. 

17. However, they are roughly parallel to those used by Robinson et al.,
 

Public Participation in the Arts.
 

18. Wells and Gubar, "Life Cycle Concept." 

19. Paul DiMaggio and Francis Ostrower, Race, Ethnicity and Participation
 

in the Arts: Patterns of Participation by Black, Hispanic and White
 

Americans in Selected Activities from the 1982 and 1985 Surveys of
 

Public Participation in the Arts. Report to the National Endowment for
 

the Arts, Research Division, June 1987. Using a different approach and
 

more information from the SPPA database, DiMaggio and Ostrower
 

have concluded that there are differences in consumption due to race and
 

ethnicity (i.e. Hispanic origin), but that these differences are largely
 

attributable to differences between these groups and the white majority
 

in other socioeconomic characteristics such as education.
 

20.	 Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas are metropolitan areas with 

populations of 250,000 or more. They include a population nucleus and 

adjacent communities which have a high degree of economic and social 

integration with the nucleus. After 1983, SMSAs were redefined and 

named as Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs). 

21. This calculation does not weight attendance in a category by the number 

of times a respondent attended in the category. 

22. See, for example, Franklin B. Evans, "Psychological and Objective 

Factors in the Prediction of Brand Choice: Ford Versus Chevrolet," 

Journal of Business, October 1959, pp. 340-369; Henry J. Claycamp, 

"Characteristics of Owners of Thrift Deposits in Commercial Banks and 

Savings and Loan Associations," Journal of Marketing Research, May 

1965, pp. 163-170. 

5O 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

23.	 Edgar A. Pessemier, Philip C. Burger, and Douglas J. Tigert, "Can New 

Product Buyers be Identified?" Journal of Marketing Research, November 1967, pp. 34%369. 

24.	 See, for example, Thomas S. Robertson and John N. Kennedy, "Prediction of Consumer Innovators: Application of Multiple Discriminant 

Analysis," Journal of Marketing Research, February 1968, pp. 64-69. 

25.	 Race in this equation could not be interpreted. 

26.	 See Andreasen and Belk, "Predictors of Attendance," and Orend, Socialization and Participation. 

51
 
Alan R. Andreasen 

APPENDIX A
 

Candidate Variables for Discriminant Analysis
 

Life-style Characteristics 

Outdoor, Individual 

Go to movies
 

Go to sports
 

Camp/hike
 

Play sports
 

Exercise, jog
 

Do charity work
 

Out of Home, Family 

Visit art museum 

Visit science museum 

Visit historic site 

Visit art fairs 

Visit amusement parks 

Visit zoo 

Creative 

Do crafts 

Do needlecrafts 

Paint, sculpt 

Write poems, stories 

Take arts class 

Do photography 

Play musical instrument 

Act, sing, dance 

In -Home 

Play games 

Read books, magazines 

Read novels, poetry 

Collect stamps, coins 

Cook gourmet meals 

Repair home, vehicles 

Garden 

Read, listen to poetry 

Backstage 

Musical, play, ballet 

Jazz, classical performance 

Family Life Cycle 

Young single 

Young, married, no child 

Children under six at home 

Children six or older 

Older, no child 

Elderly 

Arts on Other Media 

Television
 

Radio
 

Records, tape
 

Employment 

Employed
 

Number of hours worked
 

Professional/managerial
 

Other Socioeconomic 

Characteristics 

Age 

Years of education
 

Household size
 

Total family income
 

Income over $30,000
 

Female
 

In SMSA
 

Black
 

Hispanic
 

Attended college
 

Other 

Hours of TV viewing 

Parental encouragement as child 

Childhood classes in the arts 

Adult classes in the arts 

52 
Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts 

About the Author 

Alan R. Andreasen is professor and head of the Department of Marketing 

at the University of Connecticut. He is an internationally known consultant 

and author on marketing for non-profit organizations. 

53
 
Other Publications of Interest 

Readers of this report may wish to obtain more information about the details 

of the study and about related research projects conducted for the Research 

Division of the National Endowment for the Arts. The following reports are 

available at libraries, bookstores or from their publishers: 

Socialization and Participation in the Arts 

Richard J. Orend 

Research Division Report #21 

54 pages 

National Endowment for the Arts (1989) 

Available from the American Council on the Arts, 1285 Avenue of the. 

Americas, New York, NY 10019 

Who Reads Literature? 

Nicholas Zill & Marianne Winglee 

Research Division Report #22 

104 pages, 0-932020-86-0 

Seven Locks Press (1990) $9.95 

The Audience for American Art Museums 

J. Mark Davidson Schuster 

Research Division Report #23 

60 pages, 0-929765-00-1 

Seven Locks Press (1991) $10.95 

In addition the following reports are available through the Education 

Research Information Center (ERIC) system: 

Dan Abreu, "Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, Musical Theater, 

Operetta, and Opera Attendees." April 1, 1987, ERIC Identification Number: 

ED 289 760. 

Carol Keegan, "Public Participation in Classical Ballet: A Special Analysis of 

the Ballet Data Collected in the 1982 and 1985 Survey of Public Participation in 

the Arts." April 30, 1987. ERIC Identification Number: ED 288 756. 

55 
David Waterman, "Public Participation in the Arts Via the Media." September 

1987, ERIC Identification Number: ED 290 674. 

Jerry West, "Public Participation in the Arts: Demands and Barriers." ERIC 

Identification Number: ED 287 764. 

Harold Horowitz, "The American Jazz Audience." ERIC Identification 

Number: ED 280 757. 

John Robinson, et al., "Public Participation in the Arts: Final Report of the 1982 

Survey." Survey Research Center, University of Maryland, January 1986. ERIC 

Identification Number: ED 264 168. 

John Robinson, et al., "Survey of Public Participation in the Arts: 1985 Volume I, 

Project Report." Survey Research Center, University of Maryland, March 1987. 

ERIC Identification Number: ED 289 763. 

Judith R. Blau, "The Geography of Arts Participation: Report on the 1982 and 

1985 Surveys of Public Participation in the Arts." March 1987. ERIC Identification Number: ED 289 762. 

Paul DiMaggio, "Race, Ethnicity and Participation in the Arts: Patterns of Participation by Black, Hispanic and White Americans in Selected Activities from 

the 1982 and 1985 Surveys of Public Participation in the Arts." June 1987. ERIC 

Identification Number: ED 293 759. 

J. Mark Davidson Schuster, "An Inquiry into the Geographic Correlates of 

Government Arts Funding." ERIC Identification Number: ED 298 023. 

The documents are the original research reports as prepared by the investigators. They contain extensive information about methods, and numerous tables 

and figures. The ERIC collection is available at hundreds of libraries in the United 

States and abroad, as well as "on-line" from computerized information services. 

Requests for information about the purchase of microfiche or photocopies 

of these reports should be sent to: ERIC Document Reproduction Services, 

Consumer Service, P.O. Box 190, Arlington, VA 22210. 

56 
E.xpanding the Audience


for the Performing Arts
 

Becoming involved in the arts is not a one-step process but a 

progression through several stages. Upon this simple, yet valuable, 

premise, rests Expanding the Audience for the Performing Arts. 

According to the author, a person travels from disinterest to active 

attendance as they approach becoming part of the audience for the 

performing arts. For arts administrators seeking to expand their 

audiences, understanding where on this continuum rest the people 

they seek to attract is critical to their success. 

A six-stage model is proposed in this study and is tested using data 

from the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts. The findings 

validate the usefulness of this approach for both arts managers and 

future researchers in the field. 

Alan R. Andreasen 

University of Connecticut 

Research Division Report #24 

National Endowment for the Arts