Barcelona study shows decline in Catalan use among youth

A study conducted by the Institut d'Estudis Catalans (IEC) in collaboration with the Barcelona City Council has revealed a significant decline in the use of the Catalan language among youth in sports and leisure settings. The research, part of the ‘Joves i Català’ project, analyzed approximately 1,400 players and 200 coaches across various sports clubs and municipal facilities in Barcelona.

The data shows that only 11.3% of linguistic interactions between young people in these environments are conducted exclusively in Catalan. In leisure spaces within the Sants-Montjuïc district, this figure drops to just 4%. Conversely, Spanish is the dominant language for peer-to-peer communication, with one report indicating that 83% of interactions between youths are conducted solely or primarily in Spanish.

There is a notable linguistic gap between adults and youth. While coaches and staff maintain a high presence of Catalan—with 58.5% of youth facility staff addressing young people primarily in Catalan—this usage does not translate to spontaneous communication among the adolescents themselves. The study highlights that while Catalan remains present through adult figures, it fails to become the habitual language of social interaction among the younger generation.