Back in July 2020, I blogged about the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport’s (DCMS) Taking Part Survey and what the data tells us about digital engagement with archives in 2018/19 in England.
Since then, the Taking Part Survey has been replaced by the Participation Survey. DCMS describe the survey as “a continuous push to web survey of adults aged 16 and over in England. There are paper surveys available for those not digitally engaged. Fieldwork started in October 2021 and will be a main evidence source for DCMS and its sectors by providing statistically representative national estimates of adult engagement with the DCMS sectors.”
Unfortunately, the question about in-person use of archive services has been dropped from the survey, but there is still a question about digital use:
“In the last 12 months, how often, if at all, have you viewed documents from an archive in England online?”
Not a brilliantly worded question, but an improvement on the Taking Part equivalent.
In 2021/22, 4.4% of respondents reported they had viewed documents from an archive in England. This rose slightly in 2022/23 to 4.6%.
In addition, I have done some analysis of the survey datasets held by the UK Data Archive to understand the demographic of these users.
The results can be found below in the tables alongside the results from the National Visitor to Archives Survey 2022 to allow comparison between ‘in-person’ and ‘digital’ users. I will let the reader interpret the results, but in general, I would say the demographic of ‘in-person’ and ‘digital users’ is quite similar with one or two exceptions.
Archive users by age category
| Age category | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| 16-24 | 8% | 9% | 9.3% |
| 25-44 | 17% | 22% | 23.8% |
| 45-64 | 31% | 36.6% | 34.5% |
| 65-74 | 30% | 21.5% | 21.3% |
| 75+ | 13% | 10.9% | 11% |
Archive users by gender
| Gender | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| Female | 47% | 42.9% | 44.6% |
| Male | 53% | 54.7% | 53.7% |
| Prefer not to say/self-describe* | – | 2.4% | 1.7%* |
Archive users by ethnic group
| Ethnic group | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| Asian or Asian British | 3% | 3.3% | 6.4% |
| Black or Black British | 1% | 2.9% | 3.3% |
| Mixed | 2% | 2.1% | 2.1% |
| Other | 1% | 1.5% | 1.5% |
| White | 93% | 90.3% | 86.7% |
Archive users by ‘long-lasting physical or mental health condition’
| Do you have any long-lasting physical or mental health conditions?* | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| Yes | 12% | 40.1% | 39.8% |
| No | 88% | 59.8% | 60.2% |
* The Participation Survey asks “Do you have any physical or mental health conditions or illnesses lasting or expected to last for 12 months or more?”
Archive users by Index of Multiple Deprivation
| Index of Multiple Deprivation | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2018* | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| 1 | 3% | 7.9% | 6.3% |
| 2 | 5% | 8.8% | 7.7% |
| 3 | 7% | 8.6% | 9.4% |
| 4 | 8% | 9.5% | 10.2% |
| 5 | 11% | 9.7% | 9.7% |
| 6 | 11% | 11.9% | 12.6% |
| 7 | 13% | 11.7% | 11.0% |
| 8 | 13% | 9.7% | 12.6% |
| 9 | 14% | 10.6% | 10.6% |
| 10 | 15% | 11.7% | 9.9% |
* 2022 results are only presented as quintiles, so results for 2018 have been included.
Archive users by National Statistics Socio-economic Classification (NSSEC)
| NSSEC 5 Classes | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| Managerial, administrative and professional occupations | Not collected | 66.2% | 64.1% |
| Intermediate occupations | Not collected | 8.8% | 10.2% |
| Small employers and own account workers | Not collected | 6.8% | 5.7% |
| Lower supervisory and technical occupations | Not collected | 6.2% | 7.2% |
| Semi-routine and routine occupations | Not collected | 8% | 7.8% |
| Never worked and long-term unemployed | Not collected | 3.9% | 5% |
Archive users by working status
| Current working status | Survey of Visitors to Archives UK (in-person visitors) 2022 | Participation Survey 2021-2022 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) | Participation Survey 2022-2023 (viewed documents from an archive in England online in the last 12 months) |
| Working full time (30+hours a week) | Not collected | 36% | 36.6% |
| Working part time (less than 30 hours a week) | Not collected | 14.1% | 14.8% |
| Unemployed and available for work | Not collected | 3.1% | 3.2% |
| On maternity or paternity leave | Not collected | 0.5% | 0.1% |
| Retired and not working at all | Not collected | 31.9% | 33% |
| Full-time education at school, college or University | Not collected | 5.2% | 4.5% |
| Looking after home or family | Not collected | 3.3% | 2.1% |
| Permanently sick or disabled | Not collected | 3.1% | 2.9% |
| Doing something else (incl. On government supported training) | Not collected | 2.3% | 2.5% |
| Don’t know | Not collected | 0.2% | 0.1% |
Notes on the analysis of the Participation Survey
- Descriptive statistics (frequencies) were undertaken using SPSS on each variable.
- The weights “Y1SampleSizeWeight” and “Y2SampleSizeWeight” were applied.
- The ‘valid percent’ in SPSS was used – missing answers have not been included in the analysis.
Sources
Archives and Records Association (UK & Ireland) Surveys Group. (2023). Survey of Visitors to Archives 2022 National Report
Archives and Records Association National Surveys Group. (2019). Survey of Visitors to Archives 2018 National Report
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. (2023). Participation Survey, 2021–2022. [data collection]. UK Data Service. SN: 9012, DOI: http://doi.org/10.5255/UKDA-SN-9012-1
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. (2023). Participation Survey, 2022–2023. [data collection]. UK Data Service. SN: 9125, DOI: http://doi.org/10.5255/UKDA-SN-9125-1