Social divisions in the new forms of digital cultural consumption: The case of musical streaming in Portuguese society

Abstract

The disruption of the traditional models of the music industry and its gradual transition to the technological model has led to countless changes in the way music is consumed, produced and shared. With the increasing use of online platforms to consume music, the fluidity between the individual and technology has brought new dynamics to the specific practices of this consumption. This research aims to understand how the use of the Internet and its practical applications have been incorporated into cultural consumption, with a specific focus on music consumption. It also aims to present the different polarisations that can be found in these new online practices – especially in terms of age group, education and class – and to explore the implications that these different segmentations can have and how they manifest themselves, while trying to understand the reasons for their existence. To do this, we will present data from the 2020 Portuguese Cultural Practices Survey (conducted by the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon – ICS-UL), which has a representative sample of the Portuguese population aged 15 and over. The latest operationalisation of the ACM model, according to Costa and Mauritti (2018), will be used to divide the socio-professional classes that exist in Portugal. In summary, this presentation aims to discuss new forms of cultural consumption, especially those related to online music practices, and the divisions that have been and are being created thanks to these recent social phenomena.