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Young people and the arts

Last Friday marked the beginning of National Youth Week (10-19 April), the largest celebration of young people in Australia.

To mark the occasion, we’ve drawn some data from a couple of sources to look at how young Queenslanders (aged 15-25 years) engage in the arts, what they think of the arts and employment.

Young people are highly engaged in the arts – Young Queenslanders aged 15-24 years are highly engaged in the arts with almost all having participated in or attended at least one art activity or read literature. Young people are significantly more likely to create or make art (74 per cent) than the Queensland population (50 per cent).

The internet is a key tool for engagement in the arts – Eighty-seven per cent of young Queenslanders engage with the arts online, compared to 65 per cent of all Queenslanders. In general, Queenslanders aged 15-24 use of the internet in relation to arts and culture is higher than the general population. For example

  •  80 per cent watch or download art such as music, visual art, performances, or creative writing including e-books and audio books
  •  53 per cent to follow or interact with an artist or arts organisation e.g. via Twitter, Facebook, blog, apps or websites
  •  50 per cent research, interact or engage with artists, arts events or arts-related communities.

Attitude to the arts is positive – Queenslanders have a positive attitude to the arts. The attitudes of young people towards the arts is generally consistent with those of other Queenslanders, however young people’s agreement is often stronger:

  •  It is exciting to see new styles and types of art, at 93 per cent compared with 85 per cent
  •  Artists should have total freedom of expression , 83 per cent compared with 70 per cent

Young people are less likely to think the arts are too expensive (23 percent compared to 35 per cent) or that the arts are not really for people like me (7 per cent compared to 13 per cent).

 
Arts impact on individual wellbeing – Young people agree the arts can impact on the individual, their wellbeing and quality of life. They are more likely than other Queenslanders to believe the arts have an impact on:

  •  ability to express ourselves (73 per cent to 61 per cent)
  •  ability to think creatively and develop new ideas (71 per cent to 58 per cent)
  •  helping us deal with stress, anxiety or depression (69 per cent to 58 per cent)
  •  our empathy to others (54 per cent to 38 per cent).

 

Cultural occupation of young people – Persons aged 15 to 24 years made up 12 per cent of all persons employed in cultural occupations in Queensland, which was above the national average of 10 per cent.

The cultural occupations with the highest number of persons aged 15 to 24 years in Queensland were graphic designer (635), music teacher (private tuition) (357), dance teacher (private tuition) (328) and architectural draftsperson (309).

Of all persons in cultural industries in Queensland, 18 per cent were aged 15-24 years. Cultural industries with highest proportion of young people (15-24 years) were: video and other electronic media rental, motion picture exhibition, entertainment media retailing and newspaper and book retailing.
 

For further information
 
Arts in Daily Life: Queenslanders and the arts
 
Employment in Culture, Australia 2011, Queensland data
 
If you found this useful, you might like to have a look at Queensland’s Arts in Daily Life data or see how funding outcome report data links to the bigger picture data collected by Australia Council and others in The rings of value.