Childhood encouragement to attend or take part in the arts is almost as strong a factor in determining adult arts engagement as the effect of education, according to a new report, ‘Encourage children today to build audiences for tomorrow’. The report offers the latest research to be extrapolated from ‘Taking Part’, the DCMS’s survey on attendance and engagement. Data drawn from the survey, which has taken place annually since 2005, also show that parents of high social status are more likely to encourage their children to engage in the arts, and that girls and white children are more likely to receive encouragement than boys and non-white children. Even at the lowest level of education, the data show “a 15 percentage point difference between those who were taken to arts events at least once a year when growing up (77%) and those who were never taken (62%)”. The report notes the political importance of young people’s engagement with the arts, with the ‘Find Your Talent’ pilots currently in progress and the launch of the ‘A Night Less Ordinary’ free theatre ticket scheme.
