Cultural Capital and The Variety of Modes of Cultural Consumption in The Opera Audience

CULTURAL CAPITAL AND THE VARIETY OF MODES OF CULTURAL CONSUMPTION IN THE
OPERA AUDIENCE
Author(s): Jörg Rössel
Source: The Sociological Quarterly, Vol. 52, No. 1 (winter 2011), pp. 83-103
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The Sociological Quarterly ISSN 0038-0253
CULTURAL CAPITAL AND THE VARIETY OF

MODES OF CULTURAL CONSUMPTION IN THE
OPERA AUDIENCE
Jorg Rossel*
University of Zurich
Research on cultural consumption and its social conditions mainly focuses on tastes and on
products consumed rather than on modes of consumption. This article takes up this desideratum
and studies the modes of listening to classical music in opera audiences based on a visitor survey.
In contrast to the prevailing image of the silent and intellectual audience in high-brow institu
tions, the study shows there is a broad array of modes people use to listen to classical music. With
respect to Bourdieu's theory of arts perception, in particular his notion of cultural capital, one can
show empirically that the modes of cultural consumption in this case are determined by listeners'
cultural capital.
INTRODUCTION
Research on cultural consumption in empirical sociology is thriving. Broad information

has been accumulated about the social composition of audiences for different types of
cultural products and services (DiMaggio and Useem 1978; Kirchberg 2000; Peterson,
Hull, and Kern 2000; Fisher and Preece 2003; DiMaggio and Mukhtar 2004; Rossel,
Hackenbroch, and Gollnitz 2005; Lopez-Sintas and Katz-Gerro 2005; Chan and Gold
thorpe 2007a,b). Strikingly absent from most of this research, however, is a focus on
different modes of cultural consumption, and many questions have gone unanswered.
Do people perceive and consume cultural objects mainly with respect to surface-level
aspects such as topic (in fiction or movies) or color and subject (in visual art)? Are they
only emotionally involved? Or do they intellectually analyze cultural objects, perhaps by
relating them to historical knowledge and art genre categories? In this article, I shift the
attention toward such modes of consumption by analyzing survey data on opera audi
ences to study how classical and opera music is received.
Focusing on modes of cultural consumption is an important addition to research in
this area; until now, it has mainly analyzed patterns of taste and participation (Katz
Gerro 2002; Chan and Goldthorpe 2007a,b; Bennett et al. 2009; for important excep
tions, see Halle 1993; Holt 1998). The process of consumption does not end with buying
an object or paying the fee for a service, but involves the actual use and enjoyment of
goods and services. Furthermore, people do not necessarily use, enjoy, or consume goods
and services in the same way. Even the stereotypical image of the silent, intellectual
audience at a high-brow live opera or classical music performance is incorrect, as we will
see, and needs to be replaced by a more realistic image.
*Direct all correspondence to Jorg Rossel, Department of Sociology, University of Zurich, Andreasstrasse
15, Zurich 8050, Switzerland; e-mail: roessel@soziologie.uzh.ch
The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011)©83-103

2011 Midwest Sociological Society 83
Modes of Cultural Consumption in the Opera Audience Jorg Rossel
That the process of consumption is not finished once a good or service has been paid
for is well established in consumer research (Slater 1997; Sassatelli 2007). This is all the
more striking since Pierre Bourdieu, a key instigator of this line of research, emphasized
modes and types of cultural consumption. In his sociology of art perception, Bourdieu
argued that different cultural capital endowments led people to fundamentally differ in
how they decoded artistic meaning. Yet while this is a seminal sociological explanation,
little empirical research has been undertaken on the relationship between cultural
capital and modes of arts perception to confirm or deny it.
The research reported here is an effort to address these various lacunae, both
through its empirical focus on the different modes of cultural consumption in a par
ticular artistic genre, and in its analysis of the relationship of such modes to the cultural
capital consumers possess. Because Bourdieu (1984:16) argued that nothing was "more
classifying than legitimate works of art," and because he regarded classical music as the
purest and most legitimate of these genres, my study examines how classical and opera
music is received, or "consumed," by its audience in a particular city.
I relied on an established set of indicators used in studies of the psychology of music
to survey audiences about the different ways in which they listen to classical music.1 The
analysis also scrutinized the relationship between social conditions, such as the cultural
capital and demographics of the listeners and their modes of cultural consumption.
Therefore, the results contribute to research on cultural consumption in showing first
that a broad diversity of ways of listening to music exists, and second by demonstrating
that these modes are partly determined by the listeners' cultural capital endowments.
We conducted this study in Germany, a social and cultural context distinguished by
a continued and relatively high degree of public support for organizations of traditional
high-brow culture, such as concert and opera houses. Our respondents thus have a
broad array of opportunities to visit the opera and attend classical concerts at moderate
fees. They also take for granted the typical current form of behavior in classical concerts
and operas (silent listening) that emerged over the last two centuries in Western coun
tries (Weber 1975; DiMaggio 1982a,b; Johnson 1995).
BOURDIEU'S THEORY OF ART PERCEPTION AS A STARTING POINT FOR

STUDYING MODES OF CULTURAL CONSUMPTION
The most influential approach to analyze the social conditions of different modes of
cultural consumption in sociology is Pierre Bourdieu's theory of art perception. The
basic tenet of his theory is that observing and perceiving a work of art always involves a
process of decoding (Bourdieu 1968:589). This implies that artworks, whether generated
in high culture or in popular culture, can be consumed and perceived in a number of
ways depending on the particular aesthetic competence of the observer (Bourdieu
1968:592; Holt 1998). For Bourdieu, aesthetic competence is just one form of cultural
capital, which can be defined as the ability to produce collectively shared signals of high
status (Lamont and Lareau 1988:156). This may be equated with aesthetic competence,
since such competence enables a person to perceive and enjoy works of art in a way that
84 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011)©83-103

2011 Midwest Sociological Society
Jorg Rossel Modes of Cultural Consumption in the Opera Audience
signals her or his elevated social status. Bourdieu claimed that cultural capital is not only
relevant for arts participation and perception, but is also of central importance in the
process of class reproduction (Bourdieu 1984; Rossel and Beckert-Ziegelschmid 2002;
Wildhagen 2009).
Yet for many members of the lower and middle social classes, contemporary art
works are a source of confusion and misunderstanding. Members of these classes usually
use commonplace knowledge, or commonplace cultural capital, to decipher these art
works (Bourdieu 1968:590), and this only permits understanding a work of art at a
surface level. The typical result is that members of the lower and middle classes only find
those works of art beautiful that portray subjects they themselves find beautiful, such as
an attractive person or a sunset (Bourdieu 1984:44-47; Bourdieu et al. 1989).
However, a precondition for deeper understanding and enjoyment is knowledge of
formal and stylistic aspects of the artwork, as well as of the artist's position in the history
of art. Because such aspects are often not analytically understood by members of the
lower and middle classes, or they perceive the works themselves as disturbing, they
typically lose interest in contemporary art (Bourdieu 1968:601).
Clearly, the basis for an ability to appreciate and simultaneously enjoy unsettling
works of art is sufficient aesthetic competence, as that allows for a deeper decoding.
Works of art Bourdieu describes as "legitimate" are mainly those which cannot be
decoded using commonplace cultural capital but which instead serve to distinguish
social groups: "Thus, of all the objects offered for consumers' choice, there are none
more classifying than legitimate works of art..." (Bourdieu 1984:16). Yet for Bourdieu,
genres such as film do not represent a legitimate, universally accepted form of culture
(Bourdieu 1984:26-28; Bourdieu et al. 1989), so going to the movies is not a marker.
Rather, it is classical music that represents the purest and most legitimate form of art, so
it should be possible to find the most powerful effects of classification here (Bourdieu
1984:26). Our choice to survey a classical music audience attending an opera hence
examines an art form that according to Bourdieu's theory, carries the highest legitimacy;
it is a locus where cultural capital should be especially important.
However, it is necessary to contextualize this discussion of musical consumption and
its classifying influence historically and socially. The concert in its modern form, sepa
rated according to genre, especially differentiating between popular and high-brow
genres, emerged only in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in Europe and
somewhat later in the United States (Weber 1975; DiMaggio 1982a,b; Johnson 1995).
Before then, musical performances took place in taverns, theaters, or aristocratic homes,
and usually were not clearly separated from other forms of social activity like drinking,
eating, chatting, and dancing (Weber 1975:3).
The modern concert is thus a newer social institution, and a very specific context for
performing music and listening to it. Its two main characteristics are a clear separation
between genres deemed popular or high-brow, and behaviors or manners typical for
concerts of specific genres (DiMaggio 1982b). The silent, concentrated and attentive
classical music audience, showing a style of perception resembling Bourdieu's idea of a
deep decoding of art works, is a quite recent Western development, and even in Western
The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 © 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 85
societies, the live concert or opera performance is not the only way to consume classical
music (DeNora 2000; Bull 2007). People listen to such music in stores, while relaxing or
working in the household, and in many other situations where the mode of consuming
music differs substantially from the social setting of a concert hall or opera house. So the
classifying impact of musical tastes and modes of consumption studied here depends on
a very specific institutional context for appreciating the musical performance, and the
results should be interpreted with this in mind, since it is not at all clear that cultural
capital should also be relevant for the perception of classical music in stores or while
cooking.
Bourdieu notes three sources of cultural capital in his discussion of aesthetic com
petence: The first is repeated contact with specific works of art. However, this only
provides an intuitive understanding of cultural objects. The second source, by contrast,
is aesthetic competence acquired in the course of education. This allows artworks to be
understood analytically, in the sense of applying a differentiated set of precise categories
and distinctions to the perception of art, and it is a competence transferable to other
cultural fields. Unlike the intense involvement with a particular cultural field, which
results in only a field-specific form of cultural capital, education can lead to developing
a fundamental attitude to art, which is transferable from one genre to another (Bourdieu
1968:603-605). The cultural capital of the parents, the third source, also creates this kind
of transferable cultural competence, since the cultural climate at home familiarizes
children early on with a specific aesthetic approach, one reinforced by the educational
system (Bourdieu 1968:605-607).
Hence, different modes of appreciating art depend on the cultural capital endow
ments of persons, and Bourdieu's theory clearly describes the differences in reception on
the part of individuals from different social classes. In fact, his expectation is that
members of the upper classes, who have a great deal of educational cultural capital, will
show a strong preference for works of legitimate culture. A number of studies have
provided empirical evidence for Bourdieu's approach, mapping out tastes and partici
pation in areas as disparate as reading, sports, music, visual arts, and the media, and
showing that many realms are shaped by class position and cultural capital (Bourdieu
1984; Blasius and Winkler 1989; Schulze 1992; Bennett, Emmison, and Frow 1999;
Kraaykamp 2002; DiMaggio and Mukhtar 2004; Leroux et al. 2008).
However, such research also shows the limitations in Bourdieu's approach. For one,
the explanatory power of class, education, and other forms of cultural capital is much
lower if one shifts the focus to forms of popular culture or folk culture (Schulze 1992;
Katz-Gerro and Shavit 1998; van Eijck 2001). For another, most studies indicate that
determinants of arts perception and participation are multidimensional, for aside from
class and cultural capital, age, gender, and ethnicity all also significantly shape taste and
participation (Katz-Gerro and Shavit 1998; Bennett et al. 1999; Bihagen and Katz-Gerro
2000; Schulze 1992; van Eijck 2001; Lizardo 2006).
Such research is typically based on information about participation in different
cultural fields and on data about tastes for different cultural objects and performances,
and tends to ignore differences in the manner in which persons consume an artistic
86 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 © 2011 Midwest Sociological Society
object or performance.2 This is important, since Bourdieu not only assumes that social
groups with differing amounts of cultural capital show differences in aesthetic prefer
ence and activities, but also diverge in their modes of consumption. Individuals with
greater aesthetic competence, in order to fully enjoy and appreciate works of culture,
tend to apply art history categories and concepts analytically, and do not merely focus on
surface characteristics. These differences should be evident above all in music, the most
clearly classifiable form of legitimate culture. Unlike most research carried out in this
area, the focus in our study is on the different modes of consumption that actors
with differing aesthetic competence exhibit and not on individuals' different aesthetic
preferences.
Bourdieu's work on cultural consumption mainly juxtaposes surface-level interpre
tations with an intellectual decoding of art works. He partially revised his theory of arts
appreciation in a later article (Bourdieu and Delsaut 1981; Bourdieu 1996) in which,
while he continued to emphasize the importance of aesthetic competence for different
forms of art perception, he rejected the notion that applying art and art history catego
ries and schemes had to be a conscious, intellectual process (Bourdieu 1996:314). Very
much in line with his theory of practice, he stresses the importance of a pre-reflexive,
spontaneous accord between the persons' categories or classifkatory schemes of per
ception and the artwork. This is what leads to artistic pleasure and aesthetic well-being
(Bourdieu and Delsaut 1981:7), so the consequence of an all-embracing aesthetic com
petence may be more a kind of intuitive, emotional familiarity with a work of art than
a conscious, intellectual process of decoding.
Bourdieu's theory of art perception speaks directly to the focus of this article in its
emphasis on the different modes of cultural consumption determined by the cultural
capital endowment of an individual. However, in earlier formulations, he assumed a
high level of cultural capital would lead to a conscious, analytic perception of art,
whereas in later formulations, he emphasized a more emotional, pre-reflexive and spon
taneous understanding that resulted from possessing cultural capital.
BEYOND BOURDIEU IN THE STUDY OF MODES OF

CULTURAL CONSUMPTION
Bourdieu's theory of art perception has inspired much empirical research and theoriz
ing about connections between social class, cultural capital, aesthetic taste, and partici
pation. In this section, I first discuss existing research on the relation between cultural
capital and modes of consumption that refer to Bourdieu's theory. Then I show that
ideas about artistic perception and media reception, which are similar to his approach,
have been put forward by theorists in other fields. I then summarize existing research in
the sociology and psychology of music that indicates the existence of different modes of
cultural consumption, research that unfortunately often does not relate to cultural
capital.
Among the few studies that deal with the relation between class, cultural capital, and
modes of consumption, two stand out because of their competing claims. David Halle
The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 87
(1993) studied pictures and photos in the homes of people of different social classes, and
attempted to demonstrate, in opposition to Bourdieu, that even the reception of abstract
artworks, a kind of paradigmatic case for Bourdieu's theory, does not differ fundamen
tally between classes. Although working-class households own much less abstract art
than upper-class households do, there is hardly any difference in its interpretation and
appreciation among the different types of households (Halle 1993:123, 129). According
to Halle, the differences between working-class households and middle-class (or upper
class) households are so small that one can scarcely argue that the cultural capital created
by education and family background contributes to the creation of taste and the ability
to appreciate modern art (Halle 1993:137).
By contrast, and using ethnographic interviews, Holt (1998) tried to show that even
in everyday and popular culture, those endowed with differing amounts of cultural
capital exhibit quite varied modes of consumption. Those with much cultural capital
have an individual(ized) critical appreciation and deal with cultural goods from a formal
point of view. Consumers with little cultural capital instead focus more on the substan
tive and material aspects of the products or events; their evaluation uses community
standards. A recent study of movie appreciation supports Holt's claim at least to a
certain degree (Rossel and Bromberger 2009). Moviegoers with much cultural capital, in
contrast to those with a low level of cultural capital, tend to focus less on the surface
aspects of movies such as action sequences or special effects, and instead concentrate
more on the director's style, the cut, and the actors' performance. However, both studies
that support Bourdieu's claim looked at popular culture, whereas Halle's study was on
Bourdieu's own turf, high-brow arts genres. So my own study closes a gap, as it examines
the relationship between cultural capital and modes of cultural consumption for high
brow genres of opera and classical music. Furthermore, all the studies consider only
Bourdieu's earlier approach to art perception, and focus on the conscious, intellectual
decoding of art works. Therefore, I turn now to research that presents a more differen
tiated and multidimensional view of art perception.
The idea that individuals consume the same objects or services differently is well
established in several social science fields. Consumer research emphasizes that the same
good may be used and consumed in different ways in different social settings, in differ
ing local networks, or by persons from different social background (Slater 1997;
Sassatelli 2007). Cultural studies has forcefully emphasized that media reception is an
active process, and that consumers are not helpless victims of media presentations (Hall
1973; Winter 1997). There are also several theoretical concepts that bear a certain
similarity to Bourdieu's analysis of arts perception, seeing it as a process of decoding art
and music. In their psychological model of aesthetic appreciation, Leder et al. (2004)
assume people differ in their cognitive ability to master art, and emphasize the impor
tance of expertise and knowledge. Much in the manner of Bourdieu's later formulations,
they emphasize that cognitive mastery results in pleasurable aesthetic emotions. A
related concept is found in Parsons's (1987) work, where it is presumed that dealing with
aesthetic objects follows a certain trajectory over the life course, beginning with a more
intuitive understanding, moving through a focus on thematic issues, and culminating in
88 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society
autonomous evaluations based on knowledge of art history and aesthetic concepts that
underlie artworks. Mockros (1993) showed in an empirical study that it is possible to
classify aesthetic judgments according to Parsons's stages and trajectory, and that train
ing and age are indeed important influences on the mode of aesthetic experience.
These approaches bear similarities with Bourdieu's theory in their assumption that
different modes of appreciating art depend on cultural capital endowment (which
comes about through training and expertise). However, their descriptions mainly focus
on the degree of conscious, intellectual perception of art works, as Bourdieu did in his
earlier work. Only Leder et al. (2004) emphasize that the cognitive processing of artistic
objects results in conscious evaluation on the one hand and aesthetic emotions on the
other. In an empirical study of listening to classical and opera music, one should hence
expect to find two modes of musical consumption, one more analytical and intellectual,
and the other focused on pleasurable aesthetic emotions.
There is also important empirical research in the sociology and psychology of music
that broadens our image of the possible ways in which one listens to music. Behne's
(1986) research, which relied on a comprehensive set of indicators to empirically estab
lish the ways in which persons listen to music, was seminal. His item set was constructed
so as to clearly distinguish it from the strictly normative perspective of music listening
described by Adorno (1976). Like Bourdieu in his earlier theory, Adorno preferred an
intellectual, structured approach to music, and disqualified other types of approaches as
inferior.
In contrast, Behne's indicator set attempted, for the first time, to determine empiri
cally how individuals actually engage with and experience music. In his studies of
adolescents, he found modes that ranged from more emotional or bodily modes, to
concentrated and distanced approaches. Since it was first articulated, the approach and
the empirical instrument have been used successfully in a number of other studies
(Lehmann 1993, 1994; Behne 1997, 2001).
Unfortunately, these psychological studies usually focus neither on the social con
ditions of different modes of listening to music nor on the importance of cultural
capital. However, Roose (2008) has recently ingeniously combined a focus on different
types of aesthetic dispositions of classical music audiences with a focus on the social
conditions for these dispositions. On the one hand, a diversity of aesthetic approaches
exists among his interviewees, ranging from emotional and escapist dispositions, to
preferences for familiarity or liking innovation, right up to an appreciation for critical
normative stances toward society in music and musical performance. On the other
hand, variables like attendance frequency, gender, age, and education also have an
impact on these aesthetic dispositions. He found that listeners who very frequently
attend concerts are especially fond of innovative approaches to music and tend to reject
a preference for familiarity, emotional, and critical-normative dispositions. Further
more, visitors with low levels of education tend to favor an escapist approach to music
and prefer familiar pieces and performances. However, Roose only included education
and attendance frequency in his study, and he used no other measures of cultural capital
or musical training. Thus, his results are of only limited relevance to Bourdieu's theory
of arts perception. Still, Behne's and Roose's research indicates we cannot assume a
unidimensional or two-dimensional structure in the different modes of consuming
classical music: these studies indicate that in addition to more intellectual and analytical
approaches that focus on musical structure and innovation, differing ways of listening
(emotional, escapist, critical) also exist. For this reason, I use Behne's indicator set to
establish empirically how the opera audience experiences music. I also want to find out
if the differing modes of cultural consumption that Bourdieu emphasized in his earlier
(as compared with his later) work can be confirmed by the data. Furthermore, since
Behne's indicators include a very differentiated and heterogeneous set of items, they
allow for an examination of whether there are additional, as yet unarticulated, ways of
listening to music.
DATA AND VARIABLES
The data used in the present study to answer these two questions were collected by
surveying 1,170 respondents attending the opera house in an East German city. This
music listening occurs in a very specific social context. On the one hand, live opera
performance is a social setting that shapes audience behavior in very specific ways: it
not a setting conducive to talking, singing, humming, or dancing with the music, eve
though these are manners fully acceptable in other music listening contexts. On the
other hand, classical music, and especially opera, is well institutionalized in German
with generous public financing. Those interested in attending concerts of "high-brow
music do not face strong social or financial barriers, so 20-25 percent of adults in larg
German cities visit the opera at least once a year (Reuband 2008:56; Rossel 2004:106).
One can assume the composition of the opera house audience does not differ mu
from the social characteristics of those who listen to opera or classical music in oth
settings.
Our survey was carried out in spring 2005 using systematic random sampling of
visitors to 20 different performances (14 opera performances and 6 ballet perfor
mances). The research team carried out the interviews before the opera began and
during the intermission. Of 2,195 questionnaires distributed, 61 percent were returned,
and 53 percent were completed. Of the persons included in the final sample, 40.9 percent
had a subscription, 58 percent were female and 63.6 percent were academics. The mean
age was 49. This is not notably different from opera and classical music audiences
elsewhere in Germany (Rossel et al. 2005; Reuband 2007), and the overrepresentation of
highly educated and older people is true for high-brow events in the United States as well
(DiMaggio and Mukhtar 2004).
Of course, there are methodological problems here, since it is those who like lis
tening to these genres who are interviewed, while no information about perception
comes from those who stay away or dislike such music. By the same token, a popu
lation survey would not be ideal for studying the modes of listening of classical music,
since most interviewees would not be able to answer the crucial questions concerning
their perception of this music. In this respect, a survey of visitors to a concert house
or opera is well suited to this sort of investigation. It is an additional advantage that

interviewees are sampled immediately before or after they listen to live classical music,
as the mental concepts associated with listening to such music are highly activated.
However, the disadvantage is that a very selective audience was interviewed, one
largely composed of highly educated people. That means no great variation in edu
cational cultural capital exists in the sample, and this must be taken into account
when interpreting the results.
Behne's set of items tries to capture the ways music is consumed without using
normative or unidimensional concepts of aesthetic evaluation or experience. It origi
nally included 32 items, of which we used 24 (see Table 1), modifying them for opera
music. All item formulations begin with "When I listen to music in the opera," and
continue on with statements like "I sometimes want to cry" or "I try to understand the
formal structure of the piece."
Various forms of cultural capital and their sources were operationalized using a
series of indicators. Bourdieu suggested that repeated exposure to art works could
contribute to an improved understanding, although one limited to that particular genre.
So respondents were asked how frequently they attended different kinds of concerts
(operetta, musicals, opera, ballet, classical concerts in concert halls) in an effort to
operationalize cultural capital and its sources. Based on factor analysis, two dimensions
were identified, one for attending "middle-brow" events (mostly operettas and musi
cals), the other for attending "high-brow" events (mostly opera, ballet, and classical
concerts) (see Appendix Table Al). The first dimension was excluded in the statistical
models, since only the second dimension is theoretically relevant here.3 In addition,
three indicators were used to measure music-specific cultural capital. Opera-specific
cultural capital was operationalized by the item "reading of special-interest opera maga
zines." Second, a varimax factor analysis was carried out, based on five items (Had the
respondent learned how to play an instrument? Had s/he visited a music school? Is s/he
still actively engaged in music-making? Were the parents interested in music? Did the
respondent ever visit the opera or a classical music concert as a child?). This analysis
resulted in two clearly separated dimensions (see Appendix Table A2). One is the active
production of music (actively making music or having attended music school) as an
indicator of music-specific cultural capital. The other indicates the acquisition of cul
tural capital within the parental home, and thus equates to Bourdieu's third source of
cultural capital.
Differences attributable to education, Bourdieu's second source of cultural capital, is
more difficult to differentiate, as highly educated people were overrepresented in the
audiences. For this reason, distinctions were drawn, and operationalized using two
dummy variables, between those who did or did not complete secondary education, and
those who completed tertiary level education.
Hence, different forms of cultural capital and their sources could be operationalized
and systematically analyzed in terms of their influence on the different forms of opera
music appreciation. Three control variables, gender, age, and income, were introduced in
order to take account of other influences on music appreciation. These variables have
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.411 0.744 0.718 4.199
Concentration
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
Bodily 0.395 0.305 0.786 0.748 5.246
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.442 0.839 0.838 5.297
Superficial
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
Escape 0.424 0.313 0.435 0.525 0.734 0.538 7.183
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.409 0.447 0.755 0.785 0.774 0.497 0.602 10.483
Analysis
— -
— — — — — — — — — — — —
0.736 0.626 0.681 0.628 0.533 0.778 0.515 0.522 0.352 0.485
Feelings 23.527
TABLE1.Compone tsofMusicalExperince Immersed in sound Fe lingsare nga edwhenlisteni g Fe l physical sensations Rediscover motins/modsinthemusic Fe l like crying Music gets under my skin Sur ender to the music Captivated by the rhythm Music expres es fe lings Fol wthethem sandmelodies Trytounderstandformalstructure Ipay t entionto hecomposer's tyle I listen for change of key Itrytorecognizethetypeof pera Themusicans'abiltyis mportant Mind is on other things I fe l les lonely Prefer to daydream Often only half-listeni g Music gets me thinking I fe l ike singing along Ife l ikemovingintimeto hemusic The music is first priority The singing is first priority Explained variance in percent
previously been shown to have relevant explanatory power within the field of art
appreciation and lifestyle (Otte 2004; van Eijck and Bargeman 2004).
EMPIRICAL RESULTS
The empirical analysis addresses two key questions. What are the different ways of
listening to music? And what is the relevance of cultural capital to these modes of
consuming music? The first issue is a methodological, since it is necessary to establish
whether a set of items applied previously to research on adolescents is suited for use with
quite different groups. To discover this, an unrotated factor analysis was conducted on all
24 items. Factor analysis was preferred over statistical techniques like cluster analysis
(which are able to identify certain groups with specific modes of musical listening) for
two reasons. One is that the metric dimensions that emerge from factor analysis are
statistically easier to handle with a limited number of cases; the other is to avoid
reification. Cluster analysis leads to a statistical construction of groups (in this case,
groups associated with specific modes of listening to music), but exactly one group is
associated with one particular mode of listening. Factor-analytic dimensions do not
impute such coherence, and is a more suitable method, since it is entirely plausible that
listeners combine different modes of listening on different occasions.
The factor analysis resulted in six dimensions, with eigenvalues greater than 1. Items
indicating an emotional or mood-oriented approach to music loaded on the first dimen
sion (labeled "feelings"), which accounted for the largest share (23.5 percent) of the
explained variance in the underlying items. The second dimension (labeled "analysis,"
and accounting for 10.5 percent of the variance) was composed of items involving
conscious analysis of musical composition. This is a form of arts appreciation similar to
what Adorno called structural listening, and to what Bourdieu called the decoding of
deeper meaning. That these first two dimensions account for more than one-third of the
variance suggest Bourdieu was on the right track in his theory of art appreciation when
he suggested a conscious, analytical mode of listening in his earlier view and an affective,
emotional mode of cultural consumption in his later publications.
The third form of listening (labeled "escape"), however, is of a very different nature.
While still characterized by an emotional approach, this appreciation sees music as a way
out of reality. A fourth form (labeled "superficial") treats music as something only
half-listened to, a background noise involving limited concentration, maybe even indi
cating a certain degree of boredom. At first glance, the fifth dimension (labeled "bodily")
seems to hardly fit into an opera performance context. Instead, these responses appre
ciate music bodily, by humming along or wanting to move with the music. This is the
exact opposite of music appreciation modes or audience behavior mores that emerged
among bourgeois opera and concert visitors during the 19th century (Johnson
1995:232). The sixth form of music reception (labeled "concentration") is a deliberate
and conscious focus on the performed music and singing.
These six dimensions correspond almost exactly with those Behne (1997:147)
identifies, the only difference is that he subdivides "feelings" into "emotional" and
The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) ©

83-103
"sentimental," otherwise there is almost absolute consistency.4 As Behne interviewed a

relatively heterogeneous sample of adolescents, this suggests a surprising degree both of
reproducibility and similarity in the dimensions across disparate groups that emerge
from his work.
This empirical analysis shows that art perception is more multifaceted in reality than
Bourdieu's theory of art appreciation and other theoretical approaches would have it. It
is true that the "analysis" dimension matches the contrast between superficial listening
and intellectual, decoding listening that was so important to his earlier ideas, while the
"feelings" dimension comes very close to Bourdieu's more recent ideas about perceiving
art. But the other forms of listening cannot be clearly integrated into his or other recent
theories.
Instead, one has to conclude that the notion of a silent and concentrated audience at
classical concerts and opera performances only describes a part of how a musical
performance is actually appreciated. Our data suggest that there are far more diverse
ways of listening than only with concentrated attention or by consciously analyzing the
music heard. Many listeners in our survey were also emotionally moved, or used music
as an escape from more worldly concerns, or even felt an urge to dance and sing—an
impulse quite rarely acted upon at classical concerts in contemporary Western societies!
These findings challenge the sociology and psychology of music to develop a theory to
explain such diversity in music listening.
The second question is whether the different forms of cultural capital have an
influence on how respondents listen to music, once control variables are taken into
account. To this end, the six dimensions from the factor analysis (presented in Table 1)
were used as dependent variables in six ordinary least squares regression models; the
results are displayed in Table 2.
In general, the explanatory power of the models is higher than in Roose's (2008:246)
study because of the inclusion of specific measures of cultural capital. However, the
values of R2 show only a moderate level of explained variance in one case ("analysis")
and a somewhat lower level (between 5 and 10 percent of explained variance) in two
others ("feelings," "superficial"). The analytical way of listening is the one which can be
best explained by the independent variables. A closer look at this column in Table 2
indicates results corresponding largely to Bourdieu's earlier theory of art appreciation.
Individuals who frequent high-brow events, who possess much opera-specific capital,
and who make music themselves are much more inclined to listen analytically. Surpris
ingly, education and the cultural climate at home had no statistical influence, perhaps
explained by the overrepresentation of highly educated people in the opera audience.
This dimension of music appreciation is explicitly treated in Bourdieu, and the empiri
cal results largely confirm his earlier approach.
What role does cultural capital play for other types of music reception? The "feel
ings" dimension explains the highest amount of variance of the underlying items, and
accords with the notion of pre-reflexive, intuitive understanding and aesthetic pleasure
that Bourdieu emphasizes in his later works on art perception. Here we find that two
indicators of cultural capital have the impact predicted by his theory: both general
0.17** 0.07a
-0.04 (4.37) -0.02 (1.93) 0.07* (2.05) 0.05 (1.41) 0.038
Concentration (-0.83) -0.07 (-1.43) (-0.64) -0.03 (-0.71) -0.00 (-0.12) 811
0.00
-0.02 (0.00) -0.06 0.01
(0.25) 0.02 (0.67) -0.04 0.03
(0.90) -0.06 0.001
Bodily (-0.46) (-1.42) (-1.05) -0.02 (-0.49) (-1.63) 811
0.04
(0.92) 0.01 (0.27) -0.29** 0.01
(0.37) 0.01
(0.27) 0.03 (0.88) -0.01 0.092
Superficial (-7.66) -0.03 (-0.90) (-0.22) -0.10* (-2.74) 811
0.09**
-0.08 (2.23) -0.08** 0.03
(0.86) 0.09** (2.45) 0.01 (0.40) 0.017
Escape (-1.52) -0.03 (-0.61) (-2.14) -0.01
(-0.40) -0.01 (-0.19) 811
0.27**
-0.07
0.05
(1.47) 0.04
(0.98) -0.10* (8.07) 0.06a (1.81) 0.25** (7.59) 0.11* (3.40) 0.163
Analysis (-1.49) -0.04 (-0.91) (-2.87) 811
0.09a
(1.84) 0.10a (1.96) -0.10* (2.58) 0.09* (2.29) 0.17** (4.68) 0.05
(1.29) 0.02 (0.46) 0.04
(1.24) 0.12** (3.42) 0.056
Feelings 811
TABLE2.DetrminatsofModesofMusicalExperince Secondary education Tertiary education Age Income Gender (ref: male) Activelyinvolvedinmusic-making Cult ralcimateinparentalhome Opera-specific capital Vists to high-brow ev nts Cor ected R2 N a=p<0.1,* 05,*p<.01,*p<0.1Standrize grsioncefintsadf-vlues(inbrackets) hown.
TheSocilgaQurtely52(01)83- ©201MidwestSocilgaSociety 95
education and visits to high-brow events have a positive, albeit weak, influence on this
mode of listening. The small positive effect of income also supports the impression that
those in the opera audience of high social status and with a generous capital endowment
exhibit the kind of spontaneous aesthetic pleasure predicted by Bourdieu's more recent
notions.
But when comparing the results for the impact of cultural capital on the two most
important modes of listening to opera music, one finds a striking difference. The more
general indicators of cultural capital and social status are only relevant for the "feelings"
dimension. Indicators of cultural capital directly related to music and opera—with the
exception of visits to high-brow events—have an impact only on the "analytic" mode of
listening. The impression this gives is that among the "ordinary" bourgeois audience,
those of higher social status and more educational capital do indeed feel more at home
with opera music. An "expert" group also exists that is outstanding in its endowment
with music-specific and opera-specific cultural capital, enabling its members to follow
the music and its structure consciously and analytically.
Yet apart from these two dimensions, few statistically significant influences of cul
tural capital indicators are evident. Opera-specific capital and the cultural climate in the
parental home have a rather weak positive impact on concentrated listening. Those
actively involved in music-making also tend to have a slightly higher escapist orienta
tion. Listeners who often attend high-brow events are less superficial in their orientation
towards the music. Interestingly, with respect to the "bodily" dimension that deviates the
most from our standard image of opera audience behavior, none of the indicators of
cultural capital has any statistically significant influence whatsoever.
Thus, one may conclude that apart from the "feelings" and "analysis" dimensions,
there is a weak, if not nonexistent, impact of cultural capital on ways of listening to
music. This limitation on the explanatory power of cultural capital suggests that the
sociology of cultural consumption must go beyond existing—and Bourdieu-inspired—
approaches if it wants to explain different modes of consumption. It needs to enlarge its
toolkit of explanatory variables beyond cultural capital.
There are some important findings concerning the control variables. Age has the
most statistically significant effects, a positive influence on listening with concentration
and on escapist listening, and a negative influence on emotional and superficial listen
ing. Based on the results in Table 2, one can also conclude that women tend toward a way
of listening to music that emphasizes the emotional dimension, whereas men are more
likely to show a rather detached mode of perception. Income, too, has small, statistically
significant effects on emotional and escapist listening.
These findings replicate patterns found in empirical studies of the relationship
between class, cultural capital, and taste (Schulze 1992; Katz-Gerro and Shavit 1998;
Bennett et al. 1999; Bihagen and Katz-Gerro 2000; van Eijck 2001; Lizardo 2006). In such
research, tastes, and cultural participation turned out to be determined both by social
class and cultural capital and by age, gender, and ethnicity. This is another area where
theoretical explanations for different cultural consumption modes need to be developed
further, including through empirical studies.
SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION
There is a dearth of empirical research on differing modes of cultural consumption.

stands in striking contrast to Bourdieu, whose sociological theory of arts percep
focuses mainly on ways of consuming rather than on what is consumed. My stu
contributes to the sociology of cultural consumption by analyzing the different w
music is listened to by an opera audience. On the one hand, it simply tried to under
the diversity of ways music is consumed. On the other hand, it looked for the im
Bourdieu hypothesized that different forms of cultural capital had on modes of cul
consumption.
Modes of music consumption turn out to be considerably more complex than m
theories presume (see also Roose 2008). Along with the idea of arts experience as a
of analytical and cognitive mastery, and arts experience as a state of aesthetic plea
resulting from a pre-reflexive fit between subjective categories and work of art, bo
which are central to Bourdieu's approaches, our empirical study revealed a numb
other dimensions. Remarkably, these findings correspond to forms of musical e
ence established by Behne (1997) on a quite different basis, which speaks for the val
of the set of items he developed. These results demonstrate clearly that the image
silent and concentrated listener at the opera or classical music concert is too narro
especially when we find such listeners confessing that the music makes them wan
move or sing along. This clearly contradicts the staid image of the high-brow consu
of classical music.
Possession of cultural capital, assessed by various indicators, proved itself relevant

only for two of the modes: "feelings" (which corresponds to the pre-reflexive, emotional
form of aesthetic pleasure of the later Bourdieu) and "analysis" (which corresponds to
the intellectual decoding of art of the earlier Bourdieu). These were also the most
important dimensions revealed by factor analysis, as they account for the largest parts of
the explained variance. Music-specific forms of cultural capital explained the "analysis"
dimension very well, while more general indicators of cultural capital and social status
like education and income influenced the "feelings" dimension. Given that individuals
with high educational cultural capital and high social status are overrepresented in the
opera audience, it is striking that even among our respondents, those with more edu
cational capital and higher status tended to exhibit a more smooth accord between their
aesthetic competence and the musical work, leading to higher aesthetic pleasure. The
results clearly indicate that modes of cultural consumption, at least for the case of
classical music, are determined by the consumers' cultural capital. It appears therefore
that class distinctions are not only visible in differentiated tastes and products, but also
in differentiated ways of consuming (Holt 1998).
However, the results for these two dimensions indicates that more theoretical work
is necessary to develop more specific hypothesis about the different forms of cultural
capital and to specify the social and cultural conditions for these two modes of musical
consumption. While higher education, as a kind of everyday cultural capital of the
middle and upper classes, seems to engender a kind of pre-reflexive understanding and
The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

© 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 97
enjoyment of music, field-specific cultural capital seems to generate a kind of conscious,

analytical, expert habit in listening to music.
The theoretical connections proposed in Bourdieu's theory of art perception, both
earlier and later, were empirically confirmed in our survey. This clearly refutes Halle's
(1993) claim that possession of cultural capital in different social classes has no influence
on the perception and experience of art works. Yet since our study dealt only with
listening to classical music and opera, further empirical studies of the consumption of
other high-brow cultural products are needed. The role of modes of consumption in the
process of class distinction thereby could be established in a more general framework.
Modes of cultural consumption are also influenced by gender, age, and ethnicity,
factors important in empirical research on class, cultural capital, and taste. Age, in
particular, turned out to be very important in explaining different ways of listening to
music, yet it is an aspect only rarely considered in Bourdieu's work. Still, it is repeatedly
cited as a main determinant of taste and participation (Schulze 1992; van Eijck 2001;
Otte 2004; van Eijck and Bargeman 2004).5 Our results make evident that older respon
dents perceive music in a more concentrated, less superficial way than do younger
respondents, and other research corroborates this effect of age on aesthetic experience
and modes of cultural consumption (Mockros 1993; Roose 2008). Over the life course,
individuals usually have opportunities to repeatly encounter (similar) cultural products
and therefore accumulate knowledge and expertise not encompassed by the indicators
for cultural capital used here (North and Hargreaves 2008:76-84). These forms of
knowledge and expertise should be topic of further research.
The differences in modes of cultural consumption, meant here in the sense of
different ways of listening to music, are a fertile ground for sociological research.
However, as this study focused only on the perception of classical music and opera in
a very specific setting for live performances, further research in other kinds of cultural
consumption in different settings is needed before any firm conclusions can be drawn.
Our study also indicates that existing theories of art perception, especially in the two
versions developed by Pierre Bourdieu, are excellent starting points for explaining
cultural consumption—but need to be taken further, both theoretically and empiri
cally. Further theoretical work should develop more precise ideas about the impact of
cultural capital and other factors that explain the diversity of modes of listening to
music.
NOTES
I have to thank the editors and the reviewers of the journal for their extremely helpful
comments and suggestions.
'"Ways" and "modes" of consumption are used interchangeably here.

2This is strikingly demonstrated in the 2007 special issue of Poetics dedicated to "Social Status and
Cultural Consumption in Seven Countries" (edited by Tak Wing Chan and John Goldthorpe),
where the focus is solely on taste and participation as aspects of cultural consumption rather than
on specific modes of consumption.
98 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011)©83-103

2011 Midwest Sociological Society
3The middle-brow dimension also had no statistically significant effects on the dependent
variables.
4Behne (1997) arrived at nine dimensions in his study. The items of the two dimensions that do
not appear here (associative, stimulative) were not dealt with in this study, as they were deemed
less relevant for opera audiences.
5This is not explicitly discussed in Bourdieu's main publications (Bourdieu 1968; Bourdieu,
Darbel, and Schnapper 1997), although he mentions statistical information on different age
groups several times (Bourdieu 1984:212; Bourdieu etal. 1997: 27-29), and explicitly analyzes
the social conditions that shape career trajectories in different generations of the ruling class
(Bourdieu 1984:295-297).
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The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 101
APPENDIX
TABLE Al. Attendance at Musical Performances (Varimax)
Middle-brow High-brow
Operetta 0.861 —
Musicals 0.860 —
Opera 0.378 0.707

Ballet —
0.658
Concert hall event —
0.510
Explained variance in percent 38.301 24.896
Factor loadings under 0.3 are not taken into account.
TABLE A2. Musical Education (Varimax)
Active production Cultural climate

of music in parental home
Plays a musical instrument 0.794 —
Attended music school 0.796 —
Still 0.796
actively
—
Parents are musical —

0.782
Visited the opera/classical —

0.836
concert as a child
Explained variance in % 43.083 22.846
Factor loadings under 0.3 are not taken into account.
TABLE A3. Variable Description
Standard
Mean deviation Value range

Immersed in sound 3.96 1.07 1-5
Feelings are engaged when listening 3.88 0.96 1-5
Feel physical sensations 3.16 1.24 1-5
Rediscover emotions/moods in the mu 3.57 0.99 1-5
Feel like crying 2.30 1.12 1-5
Music gets under my skin 4.12 0.87 1-5
Surrender to the music 3.55 1.09 1-5
Captivated by the rhythm 3.43 0.95 1-5
Music expresses feelings 3.54 0.99 1-5
Follow the themes and melodies 3.86 1.01 1-5
Try to understand formal structure 2.89 1.27 1-5
I pay attention to the composer's style 2.99 1.23 1-5
I listen for change of key 2.26 1.21 1-5
I try to recognize the type of opera 2.78 1.38 1-5
The musicians' ability is important 3.40 1.25 1-5
102 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

© 2011 Midwest Sociological Society
Standard
Mean deviation Value range
Mind is on other things 2.42 1.03 1-5
I feel less lonely 2.45 1.25 1-5
Prefer to daydream 2.72 1.13 1-5
Often only half-listening 2.03 0.99 1-5
Music gets me thinking 2.74 1.16 1-5
I feel like singing along 2.07 1.24 1-5
I feel like moving in time 2.05 1.08 1-5
to the music
The music is first priority 3.18 0.97 1-5
The singing is first priority 3.60 1.01 1-5
Secondary education 0.21 0.41 0-1
Tertiary education 0.64 0.48 0-1
Age 48.97 17.25 13-82
Gender (ref. male) 0.58 0.49 0-1

Income 2,254 1,434 250-6,000
Opera-specific capital 0.44 0.88 0-3

© 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 103

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Research on cultural consumption in empirical sociology is thriving. Broad information

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BOURDIEU'S THEORY OF ART PERCEPTION AS A STARTING POINT FOR

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86 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 © 2011 Midwest Sociological Society

BEYOND BOURDIEU IN THE STUDY OF MODES OF

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88 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society

The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 © 2011 Midwest Sociological Society 89

DATA AND VARIABLES

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or opera is well suited to this sort of investigation. It is an additional advantage that

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92 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society

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"sentimental," otherwise there is almost absolute consistency.4 As Behne interviewed a

94 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 © 2011 Midwest Sociological Society

96 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103 2011 Midwest Sociological Society

SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION

There is a dearth of empirical research on differing modes of cultural consumption.

Possession of cultural capital, assessed by various indicators, proved itself relevant

The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

enjoyment of music, field-specific cultural capital seems to generate a kind of conscious,

'"Ways" and "modes" of consumption are used interchangeably here.

98 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011)©83-103

The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

100 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

TABLE Al. Attendance at Musical Performances (Varimax)

Opera 0.378 0.707

Explained variance in percent 38.301 24.896

Factor loadings under 0.3 are not taken into account.

TABLE A2. Musical Education (Varimax)

Active production Cultural climate

Plays a musical instrument 0.794 —

Attended music school 0.796 —

Parents are musical —

Visited the opera/classical —

Explained variance in % 43.083 22.846

Factor loadings under 0.3 are not taken into account.

TABLE A3. Variable Description

Mean deviation Value range

Feelings are engaged when listening 3.88 0.96 1-5

Feel physical sensations 3.16 1.24 1-5

Rediscover emotions/moods in the mu 3.57 0.99 1-5

Feel like crying 2.30 1.12 1-5

Music gets under my skin 4.12 0.87 1-5

Surrender to the music 3.55 1.09 1-5

Captivated by the rhythm 3.43 0.95 1-5

Music expresses feelings 3.54 0.99 1-5

Follow the themes and melodies 3.86 1.01 1-5

Try to understand formal structure 2.89 1.27 1-5

I pay attention to the composer's style 2.99 1.23 1-5

I listen for change of key 2.26 1.21 1-5

I try to recognize the type of opera 2.78 1.38 1-5

The musicians' ability is important 3.40 1.25 1-5

102 The Sociological Quarterly 52 (2011) 83-103

Mind is on other things 2.42 1.03 1-5

I feel less lonely 2.45 1.25 1-5

Prefer to daydream 2.72 1.13 1-5

Often only half-listening 2.03 0.99 1-5