Australian Bureau of Statistics
Celebrating the International Year of Statistics 2013

• Summary
• Downloads
• Explanatory Notes
• Related Information
• Past & Future Releases

The 2011-2012 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) is an international survey coordinated by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The OECD proposes to publish international results on 8 October 2013 in a comprehensive International Report. Access will be provided free of charge to an online Data Explorer tool with which it will be possible to design and create output in the form of tables only. Security measures will ensure the confidentiality of survey respondents. These outputs will be available from the OECD website at www.oecd.org.

This release contains preliminary Australia data, if further data processing by OECD identifies changes that need to be made, this release will be updated.

The microdata from the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) 2011-2012 is available as a Basic CURF on CD-ROM.

This product provides proficiency scores (termed plausible values) assessed through exercises completed by respondents in three domains: literacy, numeracy and problem solving in a technology-rich environment. Information on education and training, employment, income and skill use in literacy, numeracy and Information and Communications Technology (ICT) are also included. A detailed list of data items is available on the Downloads tab.

The microdata enables users to tabulate, manipulate and analyse data. Steps to confidentialise the dataset are taken to ensure the integrity of data and maintain confidentiality of the respondents. This includes removing any information that might uniquely identify an individual, reducing the level of detail for some items and collapsing some categories.

Approved users can combine information on scores from the domains of literacy, numeracy and problem solving in technology rich environments with educational attainment, labour force status or other demographic data to enable in-depth analysis of skill levels as they relate to education or work outcomes.