The Empire State Poll is conducted yearly by the Survey Research Institute at Cornell University. The poll covers a battery of core questions regarding the workplace, community, governmental, economic, media measures, and other special topical areas. This year, survey interviews were conducted by phone, from February 3, 2004 through April 21, 2004. This year, we added to these core questions to inquire about:

• The pattern of participation in the cultural activities throughout New York State
   
• The value and differences in the importance of cultural activities to residents in upstate and downstate regions, and metro and non-metro areas, by a variety of demographic characteristics such as age, income, and marital status
   

The Empire State Poll sample consists of a random selection of listed households throughout New York State with the upstate and downstate regions as the units of analysis. To better match the actual New York State household distribution, a weight of 0.75 was added to the upstate region and a weight a 1.25 to the downstate households in the downstate region. The 802 respondents were divided by 413 upstate households and 407 downstate regions, yielding a weighted sum of 819 respondents; 38% (310) for upstate and 62% (509) for downstate. There is a one in twenty chance of sampling error greater than 4.9 percentage points. The overall ESP 2004 result does not vary by more than 3.5 percentage points if all New York State residents were interviewed.

Of the 62 New York State Counties, downstate consists of New York, Rockland, Kings, Richmond, Westchester, Suffolk, Queens, Nassau, and Bronx counties. Upstate is the 53 remaining counties.
 

Demographic Summary of the Overall Poll Results

• The gender distribution between upstate and downstate regions is similar. In both areas, female adults occupy the larger share; by 7% in upstate and by 9% in downstate. The concentration of females is slightly higher in the downstate region.
   
• The marital status statistics of upstate and downstate populations are inverted. In upstate, the major group (54.4%) is adults who are married or have partners, while the major group (54.8%) in downstate is single adults.
   
• Downstate populations have higher educational attainment levels. Over 48% downstate adults have a bachelor's degree or more compared to 43.8% of upstate adults.
   
• Downstate households earn higher earnings than do upstate households. In upstate households, the share of those in the income brackets below $100,000 is larger than that in downstate households. For the $100,001+ income bracket, downstate is 4.7% greater than upstate.
   

Findings Regarding the Value of Cultural Activities

The Empire State Poll results reveal the following about the attitudes and participation of New York state residents in cultural activities:

• Time is the greatest barrier for attending cultural activities, with more emphasis on lack of time among households with higher incomes. For those with lower household incomes, cost and expense was sited as the most given reason for not attending cultural activities, followed by lower personal interest.
   
• Upstate and downstate regions differed in their value of cultural activities. In the upstate region, 33.6% rated cultural activities as highly important, compared to 51.8% of downstate respondents.
   
• Upstate respondents born between 1946 and 1980 valued cultural activities the least. Over 44% of those born between 1946 and 1970 rated the importance of cultural activities as not important. Only 34.5% rated it as important. Even more striking were those born 1971 to 1980, where over 60% gave cultural activities the lowest rating, compared to 24.5% who rated it as important.
   
• By contrast, 31.9% of those born between 1946 and 1970, slightly over 36% in the downstate region, rated cultural activities as unimportant compared to over 52% who rated it as important. The findings were similar for those born between 1971 to 1980. This disparity represents a significant divergence between the two regions.
   
• In both regions, female residents rank cultural activities more positively. In upstate, 52.4 % of the males rank cultural activities negatively. However, downstate female and males (55.6% and 47.2%, respectively) show positive attitudes about cultural activities indicating that downstate populations rank cultural activities more highly than do upstate residents.
   
• There were a few key differences in the responses from metro and non-metro households. While cost and expense was more important to upstate metro residents, travel time was cited more often than cost and expense by non-metro residents. Upstate non-metro area residents have a generally lower interest in cultural activities than do their metro counterparts. In both metro and non-metro areas, the most favored cultural activities were performing arts (such as plays and dance), music, and arts/visual arts.
   
• There doesn't appear to be a significant relationship between the ranking of cultural importance and choice of location. However, over 52% of upstate respondents who want to move away, want to leave New York State.
   
• In both regions, the higher the education level, the more the respondent rated cultural activities as important. In upstate, many residents with less than a bachelor's degree (52.9%) rated importance of cultural activities as unimportant, compared to 38.9% of residents with a bachelor's degree or more who rated cultural activities as important.
   
• In downstate, all educational levels valued cultural activities.
   
• Upstate residents with incomes below $100,000 did not value cultural events as highly as those respondents with high incomes. For example, 48% of those respondents who earned $35,000 to $100,000 rated cultural activities as unimportant, compared to 29.7% who valued cultural activities. Those in the highest income bracket (over $100,000) rated the importance of cultural events the highest - 45.7%.
   
• In contrast, for downstate residents with incomes below $35,000, 57.6% rated cultural events as important, compared to 29.4% that didn't. Nearly 55% of those in the highest income group rated cultural activities very highly as well.
   
• In both downstate and upstate regions, the three top creative activities are the performing arts, music, and arts/visual arts. However, there were variations in preferences based on demographic characteristics. For example, in both regions, those born between 1946 and 1970 represented the largest population to frequent cultural activities. The same applies to females, to those who are married or partnered, and to those with educational levels with a bachelor's degree and above.
   
• Educational levels pointed to slightly different cultural preferences, particularly for upstate residents. Those with less than a Bachelor's degree, compared to those with a Bachelor's degree or more, favored community sponsored events (72% vs 27%), family-oriented events (68% vs 32%), and crafts and antiques (61% vs 39%).

top