Regional Observatory for Culture. Note 3/2023 | Edited by S. Iommi, with statistical support from M. L. Maitino and V. Patacchini
Maturely developed societies are facing epochal challenges.
The best known is the one for environmental sustainability: the pressure on natural resources must be eased, otherwise many territories will lose their livability, but this process must be guided to limit its costs, e.g. in terms of job losses.
Another no less important challenge is that of the so-called demographic transition. The most developed territories have been suffering for some time from an intense process of population ageing, which jeopardises the social balances experienced so far. An older society is a society that participates less in the production process, because fewer people are working, but it is also a society that demands more welfare services, from health services to assistance with everyday activities.
Many of the most contested reforms of recent years have aimed at narrowing the gap between productive capacity and welfare needs, acting mainly on the former (postponement of the retirement age, change of the pension system from wage-based to contributory). Important policy spaces exist, however, also on the needs side. This aspect is well known in the health sphere, where the concept of preventive medicine has long been affirmed, which focuses on the spread of lifestyles capable of slowing down the processes of physical and mental decline associated with ageing, thus containing and delaying the need for curative interventions.
So far, the recommendations for healthy lifestyles have focused on aspects of physical well-being: healthy and moderate eating, abstaining from harmful consumption such as smoking and alcohol, moderate daily physical activity, and avoiding polluted and harmful environments are recommended.
More recently, probably also due to the emergence of illnesses linked to cognitive decline (e.g. Alzheimer’s) and psychological malaise (depressive states of loneliness), there has been a growing focus on intangible consumption, such as cultural consumption, which can have important positive effects in terms of intellectual liveliness and richness of social relations.
This note proposes an initial exploration of the link between cultural participation and satisfaction with one’s state of health, using data from the ISTAT-Multiscopo sample survey ‘Aspects of everyday life’. The data currently available are not yet fully satisfactory and the topic requires further investigation, however, some initial positive clues do emerge. Firstly, cultural practice is associated with an increased likelihood of perceiving oneself as being in good health, all other things being equal. Secondly, over the observed period (2005- 2020), the positive effect of cultural consumption increased. This means that as the population grows older and differences in educational levels diminish (due to the greater investment in schooling typical of mature societies), the influence exerted by lifestyles increases, of which intangible aspects, such as cultural consumption, are a very important part.
