Background to
the Research
- This
research formed part of an international programme of surveys known
as the International Adult Literacy Survey. The Northern Ireland Survey
was carried out by the Central Survey Unit of the Northern Ireland
Statistics and Research Agency and was commissioned by the Department
of Education Northern Ireland, the Training and Employment Agency
and the interdepartmental Social Steering Group.
Research
Approach
- The
survey was the first literacy survey to be carried out in Northern
Ireland on a representative probability sample of adults of working
age. It set out to profile the literacy abilities of adults aged between
16-65 using an internationally agreed measurement instrument and survey
implementation protocols which covered among other things, interviewer
instructions and scoring procedures. The survey measured three dimensions
of literacy:
- Prose
- the knowledge and skills required to understand and use information
from texts such as newspaper articles and passages from fiction.
- Document
Literacy - the knowledge and skills required to locate and use
information contained in various formats such as timetables, charts
and forms.
- Quantitative
Literacy - the knowledge and skills required to apply arithmetic
operations either alone or sequentially such as calculating savings
from a sale advertisement or working out the interest required
to achieve a desired return on investment.
- Performance
on each of these scales was grouped into five literacy levels, Level
1 representing the lowest ability range and level 5, the highest.
Because of the small proportion of people at Level 5, data are presented
for Levels 4 and 5 combined.
Main
Findings
Distribution
of literacy skills
- Twenty
four per cent of the population of working age performed at Level
1 on the prose scale, 30% at Level 2, 31% at Level 3 and 15% at Level
4/5. The distribution was similar on the document and quantitative
scales. Among men, performance on the prose scale was poorer than
on either the document or quantitative scales whereas women performed
worse on the document scale.
- Whilst
the skill levels of men and women were similar on the prose scale,
significantly higher proportions of men than women were at Level 4/5/5
on both document and quantitative literacy (17% and 23% of men compared
with 13% and 15% of women).
- On
both the prose and document scales a higher proportion of those aged
45 scored at Level 1, but this was only significantly so for the over
55s. The variation in skills with age was not so obvious on the quantitative
scale.
- The
performance of those aged up to 45 years was similar on all three
literacy scales.
- Literacy
was strongly associated with education, the percentage of people performing
at the higher literacy levels increasing with increasing education.
Those with lower levels of education were more likely to be at literacy
Levels 1 and 2.
- Those
in employment and full-time students were more likely than the unemployed
or economically inactive to perform at the highest literacy levels,
Level 4/5, on all three dimensions.
- The
unemployed were twice as likely as those in employment to perform
at level 1.
- Those
in the lowest two income groups were more likely to perform at Level
1 than those in the two highest income groups.
- Respondents
in receipt of Social Security benefits (excluding pensions and Child
Benefit) were much more likely to have low literacy skills than those
not in receipt of benefits.
- On
all three dimensions there were no significant differences in the
overall distribution of literacy skills between Northern Ireland and
the United Kingdom as a whole.
Literacy
and work
- Expanding
industries such as the financial, Information Technology and research
sectors has larger proportions of employees at the higher literacy
levels.
- Employees
in declining industries such as manufacturing or construction, were
more likely to be at the lower literacy than those in other occupations.
Just over a third of professional occupations performed at Level 4/5
on prose literacy, with higher proportions performing at that level
for both the document and quantitative dimensions.
- Generally,
those who reported engaging in literacy activities at least once a
week as part of their job demonstrated higher literacy skills in each
dimension than those who reported engaging in these activities less
frequently.
- In
those occupations with poor average proficiency levels on the three
literacy dimensions, substantial proportions of workers were regularly
required to undertake activities that required reading skills.
- Those
with the greatest income from employment were those with the highest
literacy skills; over half (52%) of those in the highest income group
performed at Level 4/5 on quantitative literacy and a further 31%
were at Level 3 with very few demonstrating low quantitative ability.
Literacy
in everyday life
- Those
who read books daily were more likely than those who never read books
to be at Levels 3 or above on all three literacy dimensions.
- Thirty
eight per cent of respondents considered there reading skills as 'excellent'
and 46% described them as 'good' even though 54% of all respondents
were at the lowest two levels on the prose scale.
People
With low literacy skills
- People
at each end of the literacy distribution each formed a clearly defined,
relatively homogenous group whilst people on Levels 2 and 3 were more
diverse in their characteristics.
- People
performing at Level 1 on the literacy scales were predominantly older,
and had low levels of education. They were more likely than people
at higher levels to be unemployed, and to have low incomes.
- Those
at Level 4/5 were predominantly young (aged 45 or under), with high
levels of education, although a considerable proportion (43% on the
prose scale) had not continued their formal education beyond lower
secondary level. Those at Level 4/5 on the document and quantitative
scales were more likely to be men. People at 4/5 were the most likely
to be in employment.
Literacy
skills in other countries
- Northern
Ireland's distribution was similar to that in other English speaking
countries, with slightly higher proportions at Levels 2 and 3 than
there are at Levels 1 and Level 4/5.
- Relative
to other countries, Northern Ireland and other English speaking countries
appear more polarised with relatively large proportions of the population
at both the lower and upper literacy levels.
- In
Northern Ireland, as in all countries except the USA, the proportion
at literacy Levels 1 and 3 was highest in the oldest age-groups.
- In
all countries people with higher levels of educational attainment
tended to perform at higher literacy levels in all three scales but
the relationship was stronger in some countries than in others.
- In
most countries, people performing at the lower literacy levels were
more likely to be unemployed than those who performed at the higher
literacy levels.
- In
Northern Ireland and in all other countries the expected relationship
between literacy and occupation was observed with large proportions
of managers/professionals and technicians performing at the higher
literacy levels on all three scales.
Literacy
in the two communities
- On
all three mean scores, Protestants had higher mean scores than Catholics.
- A higher
proportion of Catholics performed at Level 1 on all three scales.
- At
Level 4/5, the proportion of Protestants was significantly greater
than that of Catholics on all three scales.
- It
can be suggested that there is evidence that the gap in literacy skills
between Catholics and Protestants is declining.
- The
association between religion and literacy scores can be accounted
for by the fact that both are related to education (own and parents),
occupational status or income. The authors point out that these statistical
relationships do not translate directly into causal explanations.
It is not possible to determine from the data of this survey whether
higher educational levels explain the difference in literacy scores
directly or relative advantage/disadvantage in economic position provides
more opportunity to use, develop and maintain literacy skills.
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