International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS), Germany

The International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS) measured proficiency on three scales: prose literacy, document literacy, and quantitative literacy. In addition, also background information of participants were assessed: general information (e.g., age, sex, country of birth, language); education (e.g., highest educational achievement, current education, participation in training); current status and work history; current and recent work (e.g., profession, self-employment, and income); skill use (Literacy, Numeracy) at work.

Background questionnaire:

1. General information: born in Germany; country of birth; highest level of schooling before immigration (ISCED); years of formal education completed; highest level of schooling completed (ISCED); second level program (academic/college preparatory, bunisiness (commercial) or trade/vorcational); reasons why the respondent stopped schooling; first language (mother tongue); forein language skills; language spoken at home; language in which the respondent can express himself most easily; information on respondent´s parents: born in Germany, highest level of schooling;

2. Information on current and recent employment: current work situation; employed in the past 12 months; year last worked; number of different employers in the past 12 months; full-time or part-time employment; reasons for working part-time; Major Heading International Standard Industrial Classification for the respondent’s primary employment(ISICR); Major Heading International Standard Classification of Occupations for the respondent’s primary occupation (ISCOR); size of business; employment status; hours worked per week; during the past 12 months: number of week worked at all jobs; wanted to work in the weeks without work; reasons why the respondent did not want to work;

3. Reading and writing at work: skill use at work (Literacy: e.g. letters or memos, reports, articles, magazines or journal, etc.); write or fill out as part of main job (letters or memos, forms or things such as bills, invoices, or budgets, reports or articles, estimates or technical specifications); use mathematics as part of main job (measure or estimate the size or weight of objects, caluculate prices, costs or budgets); self-rating of reading skills, and writing skills in German; extent of limitation of job opportunities by reading skills, and writing skills in German; rating of mathematical skills for the main job; extent of limitation of job opportunities by mathematical skills.

4. Adult education and training: training or education since August 1994; number of courses in the past 12 months; major field of study (up to three courses); training or education was financially supported by the respondent himself or his family, by an employer, the government, etc.; intended aim of these training courses (e.g. a university degree/ diploma/ certificate, a trade-vocational diploma, etc.); provider of this training or education; weeks the course(s) lasted; number of days per week; main reason for course particiaption; extent of using the skills or knowledge acquired in this training or education at work; suggestion to take this cours(es) by the respondent himself, by friends or family, employer, other employees, etc.; training or education was provided through: classroom instructions, seminars or workshops, educational software, etc.

5. Reading and writing general: frequency of activities (use a public library, attend a movie, play or concert, attend or take part in a sporting event, write e.g. letters more than one page in length, participate in volunteer or community organisations, reading newspapers or magazines, reading books, listening to radio, records, tapes cassettes or compact discs); hours per day watching television or videos; currently in the home: daily newspaper/magazines, weekly newspaper/magazines, more than 25 books, a multi-volume encyclopedia, a dictionary; frequency of how often the respondent needs help from others with reading newspaper articles, reading information from government agencies, filling out forms, reading instructions such as on medicine bottles, reading instructions on packaged goods in stores, doing basic arithmetic, and writing notes and letters; self-rating of skills needed in daily life: reading and writing skills in German as well as of mathematical skills; impairment by eye/visual trouble or/and a learning disability; problems occurred while the respondent were in primary or secondary school; impairments currently exist.

6. Household information: income sources (from wages, salary or self-employment, from government or state sources (social assistance or unemployment support), from government or state pensions, from interest, dividends, investment, property or private pensions, or from other sources); estimate of personal income from only wages, salary or self-emploment (quintiles); size of household; estimate of the total income of all household members (quintiles);

Demography: sex; age.

Additionally coded: country identification code; record identification number; language of background questionnaire; size of community rural/urban; survey pupulation weight; replicate weights; language of task bookletes; plausible values (for prose scale, for document scale, for quantitative scale); level for plausible values in prose scale, in document scale, in quantitative scale; prose level; document level; quantitative level; age of respondent (international groupings); country of birth recoded to continental groupings; year of immigration (grouped); highest level of schooling completed before first immigration to the country (ISCED); highest level of schooling the respondent has completed (ISCED); highest level of schooling the respondent has completed (ISCED grouped, corrected for Germany based on the correction process); main reason why the respondent stopped schooling; highest completed level of schooling of parents (ISCED); names (titles) of these courses or the program associated with these courses (major field of study).