Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.5673/sip.61.3.3
Information About Adult Education, Barriers and Experience of Participation: Socio-Demographic Inequalities
Teo Matković
; Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The paper contributes to the understanding of inequality in adult education in Croatia
through the chain of response conceptual framework. Using data from the 2016 European
Adult Education Survey, the paper investigates inequality in all stages of the process (disposition,
search and access to information, perceived obstacles and experience) with regard to
the socio-demographic factors established as related to the differences in access (age, gender,
parental status, residence, education, income and employment status).
Socio-demographic determinants turned out to be associated with inequalities in access to lifelong
learning across all links of the chain of response. Nevertheless, the strength and patterns
of these associations differ. Inequalities in obtaining and actively seeking information about
training are significantly greater than inequality in the declared need for training, especially
with regards to the level of education and employment status. Notably, inequalities in receiving
information cannot be understood fully through inequalities in the seeking behaviour. Inequalities
are contributed to by the patterns of reach of information provided by employers and educational
institutions, and by the limited counteraction of information from the Croatian Employment
Service. Analysis of individual barriers gives expected results: costs are the most prominent
challenge for those with lower income and the elderly, distance for the people from sparsely
populated areas, family obligations for women, especially those with children, and health and
age for the elderly. Overlap with work schedules is more likely to hinder the employed and those
who have already attended education. A lower level of education is associated with dispositional
barriers and inability to attend due to family obligations. Attended training courses are generally
perceived as useful, without obvious segmentation in the quality of experiences and slightly
more favourable outcomes for participants in the middle of the educational scale.
The findings should be viewed in the context of the structure of opportunities in the Croatian
adult education regime, which bound the actions of individuals. The results indicate desirable
directions for improvement, such as intensification of targeted information outreach about
existing opportunities, but also point to the importance of investment in more concrete educational
opportunities and overcoming barriers.
Keywords
adult education; educational inequalities; information about education; barriers to participation; educational experience
Hrčak ID:
314504
URI
Publication date:
21.2.2024.
Visits: 277 *