Demographic and socio-economic variation in arts engagement across 22 countries: Individual- and country-level factors

Engagement in the arts is a ubiquitous human practice across culture, and interdisciplinary evidence highlights its importance for both individuals and society. However, there is still limited behavioral understanding of global patterns and profiles of arts engagement. To address this, the present study analyzed data from the Global Flourishing Study and reported new behavioral data on arts participation among adults in 22 countries. The study found that the highest arts engagement scores were observed in countries in sub-Saharan Africa, high-income Western societies, and upper-middle-income countries from other cultural spheres, and the differential engagement patterns were explained by both individual- and country-level factors (such as education and the proportion of population aged 65+ years). These findings reveal concerning patterns of inequalities in engagement present at individual and country levels and persistent across the life-course, while highlighting the need for continued data collection on arts engagement as a human behavior.