Emotional and community-based consumption emerged as new growth points in the contemporary cultural industry last year and are gradually reshaping the market landscape to bring unprecedented development opportunities, according to a report released at the Forum on International Cultural Industries in Beijing on Saturday.

Emotional consumption has become increasingly prominent. For example, temple tours in Beijing and Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, have become an outlet for people to express their emotions, with city walks in Shanghai and Guangzhou, Guangdong province, emphasizing emotional healing. In addition, with the growing diversification and personalization of consumer demands, the cultural industry has begun to segment different markets in areas such as anime and trendy toys, movies and games, concerts, and short-form dramas. They have satisfied community-based consumption that provides the cultural industry with new business models and profit avenues, according to the report from the forum.

It was one of the 10 highlights of the cultural industry last year, which also included new quality productive forces driving the iteration and renewal of the cultural sector, culture integration with technology, tourism and consumption creating new scenarios, new industries, and new models, and artificial intelligence reshaping the cultural creation and consumption ecosystem.

Hosted by Peking University, this year's forum, having been staged for 22 sessions, focused on a range of cultural topics, including artificial intelligence empowering cultural creativity, integration of culture and tourism in rural vitalization, and effective mechanisms for the integration of culture and technology.

Scholars and experts in the field exchanged ideas on policy formulation, theoretical research, and industry practices, and explored theories and industrial innovations for developing Chinese culture.