Testing the awareness of hazardous nature of printmaking materials among printmaking students in traditional and non-toxic printmaking programs

Objective: The literature documents and supports the fact that many art supplies contain toxic substances which are considered harmful to the health of artists, teachers, and students. The goal of this study is to investigate printmaking students awareness of hazardous printmaking materials. Methods: A questionnaire consists of seven questions was mailed to a 130 students from non-toxic printmaking programs, and 130 students from traditional printmaking programs in 10 liberal arts colleges and universities in the United States and Canada (5 universities for the safe printmaking program, and 5 for the traditional program). A total of 189 printmaking students responded to the survey instrument. The questionnaire sought information on demographic characteristics of respondents, and the awareness of students of the hazardous nature of printmaking materials. Information collected from the questionnaire was coded for the purpose of entering it into a computer for statistical analysis (SPSS Program). Results: It was found that printmaking students in both programs were moderately aware of the toxic nature of printmaking materials, but the t-test analysis showed non-toxic printmaking students were more aware than traditional printmaking students. Conclusion: This study pointed to the importance of increasing awareness of students to art materials in the traditional program.