Visits to heritage sites
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1. Main facts and figures
- in 2018 to 2019, 72.4% of people aged 16 years and over said they had visited a heritage site in the last year
- between 2012 to 2013 and 2018 to 2019, the percentage of people who had visited a heritage site remained stable (at between 72.7% and 72.4%)
- people from the Black and Asian ethnic groups were less likely to have visited a heritage site (at 42.3% and 56.3%) than White people (at 75.4%)
Things you need to know
The data for this analysis comes from the Taking Part Survey. This survey uses a random sample of people to make generalisations about the whole population.
The commentary for this data includes only reliable findings. Findings are reliable ('statistically significant’) when they reflect the total population. This means we would get similar findings 19 times out of 20 if we carried out the same survey on different people.
All survey estimates are subject to some uncertainty as they are based on a sample of the population.
Ethnic minority groups tend to have a smaller number of survey respondents. As a result, their estimates are less reliable than those for White people.
What the data measures
This data measures the percentage of people aged 16 years and over in England who had visited a heritage site in the year before taking the survey.
Heritage sites include:
- a city or town with historic character
- an historic, secular building open to the public
- an historic park, garden or landscape open to the public
- a monument like a castle, fort or ruin
- a site of archaeological interest
Percentages are calculated using the total number of survey respondents. Results are adjusted to represent the population as a whole.
The ethnic categories used in this data
Survey respondents were asked to choose their ethnic group from a choice of 18 categories.
The number of people surveyed was too small to draw any firm conclusions about these ethnic categories. So the data is grouped into the following 5 broad ethnic groups:
- Asian
- Black
- Mixed
- White
- Other
2. By ethnicity
| Ethnicity | % | Number of respondents |
|---|---|---|
| All | 72.4 | 8,161 |
| Asian | 56.3 | 487 |
| Black | 42.3 | 226 |
| Mixed | 70.9 | 121 |
| White | 75.4 | 7,239 |
| Other | 58.8 | 46 |
Download table data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV)
Summary of Visits to heritage sites By ethnicity Summary
This data shows that:
-
in 2018 to 2019, 72.4% of people aged 16 years and over in England said they had visited a heritage site in the past year
-
people from the Black and Asian ethnic groups were less likely to have visited a heritage site (at 42.3% and 56.3%) than White people (at 75.4%)
3. By ethnicity over time
| All | Asian | Black | Mixed | White | Other | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Time | All % | All Number of respondents | Asian % | Asian Number of respondents | Black % | Black Number of respondents | Mixed % | Mixed Number of respondents | White % | White Number of respondents | Other % | Other Number of respondents |
| 2012/13 | 72.7 | 9,838 | 57.0 | 394 | 55.9 | 188 | 58.5 | 171 | 74.6 | 9,054 | withheld to protect confidentiality | 22 |
| 2013/14 | 72.5 | 10,355 | 61.5 | 404 | 50.6 | 203 | 62.9 | 142 | 74.1 | 9,546 | 65.7 | 49 |
| 2014/15 | 72.6 | 9,817 | 55.5 | 367 | 49.9 | 239 | 70.9 | 99 | 74.7 | 9,050 | 64.0 | 52 |
| 2015/16 | 73.2 | 10,171 | 60.0 | 434 | 51.8 | 242 | 60.5 | 119 | 75.4 | 9,312 | 52.2 | 55 |
| 2016/17 | 74.2 | 9,352 | 59.4 | 423 | 47.1 | 242 | 68.8 | 170 | 76.7 | 8,473 | withheld to protect confidentiality | 27 |
| 2017/18 | 72.8 | 7,715 | 54.4 | 397 | 38.6 | 203 | 74.6 | 144 | 76.0 | 6,853 | 56.6 | 79 |
| 2018/19 | 72.4 | 8,161 | 56.3 | 487 | 42.3 | 226 | 70.9 | 121 | 75.4 | 7,239 | 58.8 | 46 |
Download table data for ‘By ethnicity over time’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity over time’ (CSV)
Summary of Visits to heritage sites By ethnicity over time Summary
This data shows that:
- between 2012 to 2013 and 2018 to 2019, the percentage of people who had visited a heritage site in the past year remained stable at between 72.7% and 72.4%
- although the data shows rises and falls in visits for some ethnic groups, these changes are not reliable due to the small number of people surveyed
4. Methodology
The Taking Part Survey measures cultural activity among:
- 5 to 10 year olds
- 11 to 15 year olds
- people aged 16 and over
Survey respondents must live in private households in England. The cultural activity they took part in could have taken place anywhere.
Respondents are chosen randomly from the Royal Mail Postcode Address File.
An interviewer visits respondents' addresses. They record details of everyone living at each address they successfully contact. Where possible, they select one adult, one 5 to 10 year old, and one 11 to 15 year old to take part in the survey.
The figures shown here only apply to people aged 16 and over.
Weighting:
Weighting adjusts the results of a survey to make them more reliable and more representative of the general population.
For example, if 25% of a survey's respondents are women, it won't reflect the views of the general population.
The data in the Taking Part sample is weighted to:
- compensate for unequal probabilities of selection
- adjust for non-responses
Weighting is based on mid-year population estimates from the Office for National Statistics.
Confidence intervals:
Download the data to see confidence intervals for each ethnic group.
In 2018 to 2019, 72.4% of people aged 16 years or over had visited a heritage site. This is a reliable estimate of the percentage of people in England who visited a heritage site in that period. It’s impossible to be 100% certain of the true percentage as the Taking Part Survey is based on a random sample.
It’s 95% certain, however, that somewhere between 70.7% and 74.0% of all people aged 16 years and over in England visited a heritage site. In statistical terms, this is a 95% confidence interval. This means that if 100 random samples were taken, then 95 times out of 100 the estimate would fall between the upper and lower confidence interval. But 5 times out of 100 it would fall outside this range.
For 2018 to 2019, the Other ethnic group had 46 respondents (out of 8,161 respondents in total). We can be less certain about the estimate for the Other ethnic group (58.8%). This greater uncertainty is expressed by a wider confidence interval (between 39.8% and 75.5%) for people from the Other ethnic group.
Changes over time and differences between groups are only reported on where they are statistically significant at the 95% level. This means that we can be confident that the differences seen in our sampled respondents are reflective of the population. The statistical tests used mean we can be confident that if we carried out the same survey on different random samples of the population, 95 times out of 100 we would get similar findings.
Rounding
Percentages are rounded to 1 decimal place.
Quality and methodology information
Further technical information
Taking Part technical reports.
5. Data sources
Source
Type of data
Survey data
Type of statistic
National Statistics
Publisher
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
Publication frequency
Twice a year
Purpose of data source
The Taking Part Survey measures people's involvement in cultural activities in England.
The data is widely used by policy officials, practitioners, academics and charities.
6. Download the data
The file contains: Measure, Time, Ethnicity, Geography, Value, Upper bound, Lower bound, Number of respondents, Source