There are 3.2 million more magazine readers since 1992; that's the good news

A study by the Hill Strategies Group of Hamilton indicates that about 43% of Canadians read a magazine once a week in 2005. Canadian magazine readership -- in fact readership of all kinds -- is going up, apparently because there are more people. An article in the Globe and Mail reported that magazines and newspapers both saw a bump up in total readership over where they were 15 years ago.

A similar phenomenon occurred with magazine readership. In 1992, 80.2 per cent of Canadians read at least one magazine that year; in 1998, the number was 77.2 per cent, then it rose to 78.2 per cent two years ago. But despite the lower rate of readership, the actual number of individuals who found themselves reading one or more magazines in 2005 was 20.4 million, up 3.2 million from 1992.

Hill Strategies has made a name for itself by analyzing and drilling down into Statistics Canada data about the cultural field. The study, called A Profile of Cultural and Heritage Activities of Canadians in 2005 was funded by the Canada Council, the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Ontario Arts Council and is based on data gathered in the past 15 years by the General Social Surveys of Statscan.

In 2005, 78.2% read at least one magazine, compared with 66.6% who read a book and 86.7% who read a newspaper, the study found. This is down slightly from 1992. But because of a 22.6% growth in the over-15 population, there was an increase of 3.2 million readers, or 18.7% between 1992 and 2005.

• 42.6% of the population 15 or older read a magazine at least once a week (11.1 million Canadians);
  
• another 28.5% read a magazine at least once a month (7.4 million Canadians);
  
• another 3.5% read a magazine five or more times during the year (920,000 Canadians); and
• another 3.5% read a magazine one to four times during the year (920,000 Canadians).