Two studies of museum-going in 2006, Institute of Museum and Library Services' National Study of the Use Libraries, Museums and the Internet, and the Pew Internet & American Life Project's Exploratorium Survey, estimate that approximately 30% of all American adults visited an art museum in the previous 12 months. The SPPA data on art museum-going presented here are not as current, having been collected in 2002, but permit an analysis of change over the last two decades of the 20th century in rates of art museum visitation. These data indicate that in contrast to historic sites, the appeal of which declined somewhat between 1982 and 2002 (see Indicator V-13, Historic Site Visits), art museums and galleries saw increasing rates of visitation in the course of the two decades. In 2002, 26% of the U.S. adult population reported visiting a museum or art gallery in the previous year, up 4 percentage points from 1982, though down slightly from 1992 (Figure V-14).

Figure V-14, Full Size Supporting Data

Grouping the data by age of respondent reveals that the increasing popularity of art museums and galleries among older Americans drove this upward trend. For those 18–44 years old, the net increase in visits between 1982 and 2002 was minimal, and visits by Americans in this age group actually decreased substantially between 1992 and 2002. In contrast, for those age 45 and older there was a substantial rise in visits over the last two decades of the 20th century. For those 45–54 years old, for example, the art museum visitation rate rose from 22 out every 100 people in 1982 to 33 out of every hundred in 2002—an increase of 50%.

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