What are the Demographics

[joejoejoejoe]

I am wondering if anyone has found reliable, properly constructed surveys on the demographics of science fiction consumers. Alot of the stuff I gleaned has been based on online surveys or those based on a subscription to a particular sci fi magazine, thus allowing some confounding variables to muddy the data. It seems to be a popular topic lately given the recastings and story lines being developed by Marvel. Not trying to start a gender debate here, just trying to ascertain what motivates the creatives to create the recent storylines and if they are aware of their past audience or are trying to broaden it. Survey data first please, then the Marvel discussion after.

 

[Swank]

I am wondering if anyone has found reliable, properly constructed surveys on the demographics of science fiction consumers. Alot of the stuff I gleaned has been based on online surveys or those based on a subscription to a particular sci fi magazine, thus allowing some confounding variables to muddy the data. It seems to be a popular topic lately given the recastings and story lines being developed by Marvel. Not trying to start a gender debate here, just trying to ascertain what motivates the creatives to create the recent storylines and if they are aware of their past audience or are trying to broaden it. Survey data first please, then the Marvel discussion after.

The problem is that Marvel isn't SF enough to represent SF fan demographics. And that's true with a lot of films that are SF in content but have other things going on. Lots of people saw the Clooney/Soderberg Solaris who don't care for SF. Same with the recent Mad Max. Or any number of Tom Cruise films. There is no practical way of separating the motivation to see SF from action, star power, art film, horror, etc.

There is currently this false paradigm that Marvel films and the like are "nerd culture". They aren't. Those films are polished, full of action, humor, great looking stars and easily followed storylines. They are entirely popular action films, no different in major content than what got people to go see Star Wars, Raiders, Die Hard, Hunger Games, Matrix, E.T., Predator, Silverado, etc. The same people that skipped Bladerunner, 2010, AI, Moon, Under the Skin.

If you want to isolate SF fans, you'd need to track who saw 2049, Annhilation, Arrival, District 9, Prometheus or Sunshine. Those are SF fans, rather than general film audiences.


IMO.

 

[joejoejoejoe]

Interesting perspective. Where do you think Altered Carbon and Ex Machina falls in ? Again, to y original question, can you point to any reliable surveys on the sci fi demographic? I would love for someone to do a content analysis of the literature played off against the demographic profiles over the decades.

 

[Alex The G and T]

This question might open a very deeeeep can of worms in some elden circles.

My parents did not suffer television gladly; but the parental library was deep. I cut my SF and F teeth on prose. Verne, Wells, Kipling, Jack London, L Frank Baum, RLS, Poe and, I dunno, Fleming, Mclean, Le Carre.... ad infinitum, progressing on into the great SF and Fantasy prose writers of later decades.

I was never impressed by comic book renditions of heroes. Still find "Graphic Novels" substandard to the internal cinema of the written words.

In my day all I needed to be defined as a "nerd" was to carry a fiction book, know how to program a computer, or not care about the football team.

And I had about two friends who cared about what I was reading. Meanwhile, I had exactly one friend who collected comic books. I reckoned the supers were cute; but I preferred the ones which made me laugh.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

There are so many different aspects of the SF community, played out through so many different media, that it would be a truly enormous task to contact all of them and ask them to respond to such a survey, not to mention convince enough of them to participate such that you would end up with a truly representative sample. So to answer your question, I don't know of any reliable survey of the sort that you are seeking, doubt that one exists, or that anyone would take on such a tremendous task in the foreseeable future.

Sorry.

 

[Swank]

Interesting perspective. Where do you think Altered Carbon and Ex Machina falls in ? Again, to y original question, can you point to any reliable surveys on the sci fi demographic? I would love for someone to do a content analysis of the literature played off against the demographic profiles over the decades.

Having been involved in other industries that mass market stuff, I'm going to guess that the best demographic data is gathered by publishers and held as proprietary trade secrets. Industries don't like to let people know how biased their customers are - it discourage your perspective customers and your authors if it comes out that Hard SF is a sausage party or that the mostly women read fantasy gateway stories.

From other discussions I've read, there is some rough demographic data out there, and none of it was very surprising. Women will read most anything but select Hard SF less. Men often won't read female authors, but not universally.


The problem with trying to understand demographics is that it leads to poor marketing choices. Even if you have every reason to believe that your story is likely to sell mostly to women over 55, that doesn't actually suggest that a certain type of cover art will be more effective. Because what we believe about demographics (that aren't our own) are merely subjective stereotypes. The cues that get people to decide to pick up certain books are likely as sophisticated as their readership.


As far as Altered Carbon and Ex Machina - hard to say considering Covid and streaming. Altered Carbon is dark and violent - appealing to those with less SF interest as well as SF fans of the book. Ex Machina has broad appeal because of the attractiveness of the robot and the apparent timeliness of the questions it poses. Films and TV really aren't the kind of commitment a trilogy of 800 page books represents.