Newspapers and Magazines (Tuomo S a U

¡¡¡¡Il Statistics Finland SVT Culture and the media 1994:3 Culture of the Everyday Leisure and Cultural Participation in 1981 and 1991 Mirja Liikkanen and Hannu Pääkkönen (ed.) h Statistics Finland SVT Culture and the media 1994:3 29. 08.1994 Culture of the Everyday Leisure and Cultural Participation in 1981 and 1991 Mirja Liikkanen and Hannu Pääkkönen (ed.) August 1994 TiiastoMrjasto Statisiikbi^iloteket 251 7 n Helsinki 1994 o 0 Inquiries: SVT Suomen Virallinen Tilasto Finlands Officiella Statistik Mirja Liikkanen Official Statistics of Finland Hannu Pääkkönen tel. + 358 O 17341 Cover design: Ilkka Kärkkäinen KEY TO SYMBOLS USED IN TABLES No information................................ Quantity less than half the unit used 0 and 0.0 Data not available.......................... Preface Based on face-to-face interviews with several thousand respondents, the 1991 leisure survey offers a broad overview of the leisure activities and cultural inter ests of Finnish people today. Among the particular concerns of this survey are the relationship between work and out-of-work time; the consumption of mass media; theatre-going and other cultural activities; reading; listening to music; creative hobbies; participation in organizations and societies; and sports and physical exercise. Discussions are also included on people’s choices of cultural products as well on ways in which they experience leisure. The survey provides an interesting point of comparison for the results of the corresponding studies carried out by Statistics Finland in 1981 and 1977. A large number of people have been involved in this project. Mirja Liikkanen was responsible for project planning and in charge of the research team: Anja Ahola, Hannu Pääkkönen, Tuomo Sauri, Susanna Seppänen and Ari Toikka. Expert advice was received from Katarina Eskola from the Research Unit for Contemporary Culture at the University of Jyväskylä. Many useful comments were also received from a number of other scholars and experts representing a wide range of different disciplines. The eight articles included in this report summarize the key results of the 1991 leisure survey and look at the development that has taken place in leisure activi ties over the past ten years. The interpretations suggested in the articles express the views of the authors. The report was compiled and edited by Mirja Liikkanen and Hannu Pääkkönen. The figures were done by Veli Rajaniemi and Päivi Seppälä. The layout was by Seija Töyräänvuori, and the cover designed by Ilkka Kärkkäinen. The English translation was made by David Kivinen. Some, but not all, of the tables in the study are available in English separately. Helsinki, June 1994 Hilkka Vihavainen Statistics Finland 3 Contributors Aaltonen Kimmo, Cultural Secretary, Ministry of Education Dj erf Kari, Senior Researcher, Statistics Finland, Management Services, Methodology Eskola Katarina, Docent, University of Jyväskylä, Research Unit for Contemporary Culture Liikkanen Mirja, Senior Researcher, Statistics Finland, Culture, Media, Time Use Pääkkönen Hannu, Senior Statistician, Statistics Finland, Culture, Media, Time Use Sauri Tuomo, Senior Researcher, Statistics Finland, Culture, Media, Time Use Seppänen Susanna, Senior Statistician, Statistics Finland, Information Services, Statistical Compendia Contents Page Preface .................................................................................................................... 3 Contributors............................................................................................................. 4 Creative leisure activities (Susanna Seppänen).................................................... 7 Reading books (Katarina Eskola) ........................................................................ 21 Reading newspapers and magazines (Tuomo S a u........................................... ri) 41 Television, video, radio and home computers: recent trends and breakthroughs (Mirja Liikkanen) .......................................................................... 53 Television and radio programmes: the choices of viewers and listeners (Mirja Liikkanen) ................................................................................................... 69 Music consumption and music preferences (Susanna Seppänen)....................... 85 Cultural participation (Hannu Pääkkönen) ....................................................... 99 Sports and physical culture in Finland (Kimmo A altonen)................................. 115 Appendix Table: Leisure activities in 1981 and 1991......................................... 127 Sampling, nonresponse and estimation of results in the 1991 leisure survey (KariDjerf)............................................................................................................. 128 Examples of standard errors in the 1991 leisure survey ..................................... 132 Background variables used in the articles ............................................................ 133 Statistics Finland 5 Creative leisure activities Susanna Seppänen. This article is concerned with creative leisure activities; more specifically, with participation in creative cultural hobbies and (the somewhat less common) crea tive arts hobbies (Figure 1). In the realm of the everyday these two forms of leisure activities differ from each other not only in terms of their popularity; it is widely felt that arts hobbies are somehow more elitist, whereas creative cul tural hobbies tend have a more commonplace, simple reputation. The elitist label is most readily attached to creative arts hobbies which require economic or cultural capital, such as classical ballet or playing an expensive instrument. Figure 1. Creative leisure activities in 1981 and 1991 Creative arts hobbies Creative cultural hobbies Playing an instalment Z3 Doing handiwork Singing Writing letters ' Visual arts' C •Keepinga diary Writing fiction j | | | Photographic development ■ Acting Folk dancing ; ; Verse recitation | Video filming 1) Classical ballet dancing Modern or jazz dancing ■ f) not queried in 1981 100 80 60 40 20 0 0 20 40 60 80 100 % of population aged 10 years or over % of population aged 10 years or over Statistics Finland 7 This tendency to think in terms of certain things being more valuable and pres tigious and others being less valuable and prestigious, is not at all uncommon in everyday thinking. In the case of leisure activities, high culture (which is here represented by creative arts hobbies) will typically be described as more valua ble, as having an educational function, as being conducive to human improve ment; whereas creative cultural activities come closer to the everyday, the prac tical, even the physical. Indeed if we relied on this sort of commonsensical chain of thought, we would have no difficulty whatsoever in deciding the rela tive cultural importance of writing letters vs. writing fiction; or of doing handi work vs. painting and drawing. The question that presents itself here is, Does this commonsensical notion of arts hobbies representing high culture really hold true? Is it true that people who take an interest in creative arts hobbies are highly educated, upper white-collar employees; and conversely, is it true that the less educated are more interested in creative cultural hobbies? The empirical evidence is contradictory. Katarina Eskola (1976) suggested in her studies in the mid-1970s that there is a link between artistic leisure pursuits and a high level of education; Anita Kangas (1977), on the other hand, found that education was a relevant factor only in one leisure activity, i.e. photography. In the late 1980s, a connection was discovered between father’s socio-economic status and playing classical music (Siurala 1991). In general the evidence available suggests that patterns of participation in crea tive leisure activities are clearly different in different social classes and popula tion groups. In Finland creative arts hobbies have traditionally been favoured by women. In the 1981 leisure survey (Cultural statistics 1981) it was found that with the exception of playing a musical instrument, women are engaged in crea tive arts hobbies more frequently than men. In this article the category of crea tive arts hobbies is defined as including playing an instrument, singing, visual arts, writing fiction, acting, verse recitation, and classical ballet or modern danc ing. Women are also more active than men in the reception and consumption of culture. With the exception of cinemas and museums, around 60 per cent of admissions to cultural events are by women (see Pääkkönen in this volume, p. 114). Indeed the evidence we have would seem to suggest that women in Fin land are more interested than men not only in gathering cultural capital but also in culture as a value in itself. In spite of this women occupy fewer professions in the arts sector than men (Liikkanen 1988). In 1985, 70 per cent of all arts professions in Finland were occupied by men. In other categories of creative cultural hobbies, some are clearly favoured pre dominantly by men and others by women. Men have taken a more active inter est than women in such technical hobbies as photographic development and video filming, and handiwork is also divided between distinct types favoured by 8 Statistics Finland men and women. Similarly, the writing of letters and keeping a diary are tradi tionally women’s pursuits. According to the 1981 leisure survey (Cultural statistics 1981) young people (students

Load more