|
Indicator V-4
|
Creative Writing
|
|
NOTE TO READERS: Please include the following reference when citing data from this page:
"American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Humanities Indicators, http://HumanitiesIndicators.org".
|
Data on Americans’ involvement in creative writing (defined by the NEA, the collector of this information, as the writing of stories, poems, or plays not required for work or school) may provide a window on a particularly personal form of participation in the humanities, but what they also show is that overall participation rates were quite low from 1982 to 2002, when they ranged between 6.5% and 7.5% (Figure V-4). At the same time, however, these data indicate that in contrast to book
reading (see Indicator V-3, Book Reading), participation in creative writing did not decline substantially during the period. On the contrary, slightly more Americans were engaged in creative writing in the first years of the 21st century than two decades earlier.
The greatest increases in creative writing occurred among Americans age 45 and older. In fact, participation rates more than doubled for those ages 55–64 and 75+. But even with the growing interest in creative writing among older Americans, the pursuit continued to be much more common among 18-to-24-year-olds than in any other age group. What the data reveal, then, is a strong negative correlation between creative writing and age, with the tendency to write dropping off sharply after age 24 and continuing to decline as an individual moves through middle and late life.
|