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Skills and the Information Society

The last three decades have witnessed enormous social, political, and economic change throughout the world. There are many reasons for this, but one of the most important among them is the revolution in computer technology. The processing power of computers has grown at an astonishing rate since 1980, and it continues to accelerate. This in turn has stimulated a rapid drop in the cost of information and communications technologies (ICT), together with a corresponding rise in its availability.

The result has been nothing short of transformative. Where a generation ago computers were seen as complementary or alternative tools for performing certain tasks, today they are viewed as necessities. As a result, ICT is widespread. It is so deeply embedded in modern societies that it is virtually impossible to avoid, and it increasingly shapes our experience of the classroom, the workplace, and even everyday life.

Understanding How Societies Are Adapting

Faced with such thoroughgoing change, societies need to better understand what skills people have, and how those skills are being used. This is more than simply a question of economic well-being. A great deal of discussion has been devoted to the aptitudes a population possesses and their bearing on international competitiveness — and this is a subject of great importance. Yet it must be emphasized that these aptitudes impact a range of factors that extend well beyond the relative economic standing of different countries. They also have profound consequences for such broad domestic considerations as economic disparities between different groups; health outcomes; levels of political engagement; and the degree to which people feel integrated into, or isolated from, society. The skills a country’s population possesses do not only foreshadow its future international economic prospects; they also illustrate the challenges it faces, and shape the way in which it adapts to change.

The Key Skills: Literacy, Numeracy, and Problem solving in Technology-Rich Environments

To promote understanding of these challenges, Canada joined the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC). The programme, which builds on previous international assessments, provides internationally comparable measures of three skills that are essential to processing information: literacy, numeracy, and problem solving in technology-rich environments (referred to in this report as PS-TRE).

Given the centrality of written communication and basic mathematics in virtually all areas of life, coupled with the rapid integration of ICT, individuals must be able to understand, process, and respond to textual and numerical information, print and digital, if they are to participate fully in society — whether as citizens, family members, consumers, or employees. The three skills noted above are considered key to that ability: they provide a foundation for the development of other, higher-order cognitive skills, and are prerequisites for gaining access to, and understanding of, specific domains of knowledge. In addition, they are necessary in a broad range of contexts, from education, to work, to everyday life.

This first pan-Canadian report on PIAAC presents a first look at how these key skills are distributed among Canadians and how these results compare to those of populations in other countries.

What is PIAAC?

PIAAC is a highly complex survey of the information-processing skills of youth and adults between the ages of 16 and 65.^{Note 1} Canada is one of 24^{Note 2} countries and sub-national regions participating in this initiative. In addition to surveying the entire country, Canada collected data for every province and territory.

List I.1 Countries and sub-national regions participating in PIAAC, 2012

Main Elements of PIAAC in Canada

The PIAAC survey is made up of three main parts: a background questionnaire, a direct assessment, and a module on the use of skills.

Background Questionnaire

The PIAAC background questionnaire puts the results of the skills assessments into context, classifying survey participants according to a range of factors that influence the development and maintenance of skills. In particular, the questionnaire facilitates the analysis of skill distribution across socio-demographic variables.  It also permits the study of outcomes that could be associated with skills. 

The questionnaire is divided into the following sections:

• Demographic characteristics (e.g., age, gender, Aboriginal identity, immigrant status);
• Educational attainment and training (e.g., highest level of education, where and when obtained, field of study);
• Employment status and income (e.g., employed or not, type of work, earnings);
• Social and linguistic background (e.g., self-reported health status, language spoken at home).

Direct Assessment of Information Processing Skills

The direct assessment component measures three essential information-processing skills, as defined by PIAAC: literacy, numeracy, and PS-TRE. These skills are the foundational skills of everyday life — at home, school, work, or in the community. It should be noted that they are tested in the official language chosen by respondents (English or French), and thus the results are influenced by the respondent’s proficiency in that language.

Each skill is measured along a continuum and within a context of how it is used. To help interpret the results, the continuum has been divided into different levels of proficiency. These do not represent strict demarcations between abilities but instead describe a set of skills that individuals possess to a greater or lesser degree. This means that individuals scoring at lower levels are not precluded from completing tasks at a higher level — they are simply less likely to complete them than individuals scoring at the higher level.

PIAAC recognizes that concepts such as literacy, numeracy, and PS-TRE are too complex and varied to be captured by a single measure. For example, there are multiple forms of literacy, rather than a single one. Its aim, therefore, is not to redefine or simplify such concepts; rather, it is to evaluate a specific, measurable dimension of them. The skills assessed by PIAAC are defined in terms of three parameters: content, cognitive strategies, and context. The content and cognitive strategies for each domain are defined by a specific framework, which describes what is being measured and guides the interpretation of results (OECD 2012).   The context defines the different situations in which each of these skills is used, including work, education, personal, and society.

Literacy
Respondents are measured for their ability to engage with written texts (print-based and digital) and thereby participate in society, achieve goals, and develop their knowledge and potential. This requires accessing, identifying, and processing information from a variety of texts that relate to a range of settings.

• PIAAC also includes an assessment of reading components designed to provide information about adults with very low levels of proficiency in reading. It measures skills in print vocabulary (matching words with the picture of an object), sentence processing (deciding whether a sentence makes logical sense), and passage comprehension (selecting words that make the most sense in the given context). Results for the assessment of reading components are not presented in this report.

Numeracy
Respondents are measured for their ability to engage with mathematical information in order to manage the mathematical demands of a range of situations in everyday life. This requires understanding mathematical content and ideas (e.g., quantities, numbers, dimensions, relationships), and the representation of that content (e.g., objects, pictures, diagrams, graphs).

PS-TRE
Respondents are measured for their ability to use digital technology, communications tools, and networks to acquire and evaluate information, communicate with others, and perform practical tasks. This requires understanding technology (e.g., hardware, software applications, commands and functions) and solving problems with it. Measurement is divided into two different but related parameters: 1) familiarity with computers and how to use them; and 2) the ability to solve problems commonly encountered in a technology-rich world. 

Module on the Use of Skills

The module on the use of skills collects self-reported information on how a range of skills are used at work and in everyday life, including the frequency and intensity of use. It includes information about the use of:

• Cognitive skills, such as engagement in reading, numeracy, and ICT;
• Non-cognitive skills (such as the capacity to work collaboratively or as a member of a team), communications skills, organization and planning skills, and influencing skills;
• Skills in the workplace, such as autonomy over key aspects of work and what kind of skills are employed at work.

This report does not present information or results from the module. Nonetheless, the data collected provide the opportunity for future analysis at a highly detailed level of some important aspects of the labour market, such as the extent and distribution of skills use in the labour market (OECD 2013b).

Placing Results in the Proper Context

While the temptation to make quick comparisons between countries or sub-national regions is understandable, it should be tempered by an understanding of the complexity of the data. A great variety of nations participated in PIAAC, and the populations surveyed began their schooling at any time between the early 1950s and the early 2000s — a half-century that has been marked by enormous change. Consequently, the results are affected by a number of factors that vary by jurisdiction, such as:

• The evolution of education and training systems;
• Changes in education policies;
• The development of regional and national economies;
• Patterns of immigration; and
• Changes in social norms and expectations.

The perils of jumping to quick conclusions are well illustrated by the case of Canada, whose national results derive from provincial and territorial ones. In addition to large differences between provinces and territories, there are major differences between populations within them — and these differences can only be understood in a wider context. For example, respondents in Canada were given the test in English or French, yet a portion of the Canadian population has neither as their mother tongue. As a result, the PIAAC scores for these populations are measuring skills in a second language.

Further examples of the differences both between and within provinces and territories include: the socio-demographic composition of their populations; the educational attainment of these populations; the proportion of immigrants in a population; the distribution of residents living in rural areas versus those living in population centres; and the nature of labour markets and local economies. These factors reflect the diversity of the Canadian population, but they inevitably complicate analysis of the results and undermine simple comparisons between jurisdictions.

About this Report

This pan-Canadian report is a companion to OECD’s international report on PIAAC, and its purpose is to provide a first look at descriptive statistics from the survey for Canadians.

Chapter 1 provides a descriptive, comparative analysis of the distribution of proficiency in key skills among the populations of Canada’s 13 provinces and territories from an international perspective. Chapter 2 explores the relationship between proficiency and factors that influence the development and maintenance of skills in Canada, such as socio-demographic characteristics. This exploration is deepened in Chapter 3, which studies the proficiency of selected populations within Canada. Finally, Chapter 4 provides a snapshot of literacy and numeracy skills in Canada in 2003 and 2012.

Both internationally and within Canada there will be a need to build on what we learn through PIAAC, to help understand the stories behind the numbers. This report, therefore, can be considered as a first look into the PIAAC data. It will be used as a starting point from which to undertake further, deeper analysis, which will be shared over the coming years.

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Notes

1. While the PIAAC survey population covers youth (those aged 16 to 24) and adults, for the sake of simplicity this report will only use the term “adults” while referring to both.
2. Note that at the time of writing, data were not available for France and the Russian Federation. The results in this report therefore include only 22 countries and sub-national regions.