Authors: Gwendolyn Rugg, Mitchell R. Barrows, Jennifer Novak-Leonard, Ellen Bloss, Justin Pequeño, and Lara Evans

Publication Year: November 2025

Keywords: Culturally Informed Care, Social Determinants of Health (SDOH), Traditional Healing, Arts, Survey, Cultural Engagement, Traditional Arts, Evaluation, Data Collection, Methodologies

Abstract: 
Measuring What Matters — a new report by First Peoples Fund in partnership with NORC at the University of Chicago and funded by the Wallace Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation — shares key insights from interviews with 78 Native creators and experts representing diverse art forms, and tribal affiliations.

Key findings:
Art forms and activities pertinent to Native communities appear to be excluded from survey questions that, implicitly or explicitly, center Western art forms and activities.

Native communities' arts engagement happens in broader physical contexts.

While surveys often define arts participation as leisure or professional work, for Native peoples, creative expression is also a means of cultural preservation, social responsibility, spiritual practice and community healing.‍

Because the survey's wording failed to prompt cultural associations, many respondents unintentionally left out vital aspects of their artistic and cultural lives.

Measuring What Matters calls for a greater cultural awareness in how we design and interpret surveys. By rethinking the language and structure of our questions, we can more accurately capture the diversity, depth and creativity of Natives and other communities.

File Download:

Source: Link to Original Article.

Type of Resource: Reports