Recent literature shows that younger cohorts have lower levels of literacy ceteris paribus in Canada, the United States, Norway and other developed countries. Very few explanations are provided to justify the existence of this negative cohort effect. Yet this decline has serious implications for the economy, education system and society. In this paper, we focus on Canada and replicate the results published in the literature using the same methodology (synthetic cohorts). We use the same data from surveys of adult skills, namely the International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS), the Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey (ALL) and the Survey of Adult Skills, a product of the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC). Second, we conduct further analyses to better understand the effect of time on adults’ literacy skills. We then show that age has a negative effect on the literacy score, but also that a significant “period” effect (or rather a “survey” effect) can only be explained by a change in the instrument used to measure literacy skills from one survey to another. This article reveals that the negative cohort effect mentioned in the literature may be fallacious as it is exacerbated when the control for measuring instrument distortions is omitted. This paper contributes to advancing knowledge about the effect that age and cohort has on adult literacy levels in Canada. The results weaken the idea of a clear negative cohort effect; much of this effect would in fact be caused by a non-comparable methodology that systematically assigned individuals lower scores in the most recent survey cycles. These findings are important because they highlight the limitations of analyses that can be done with the synthetic cohort method using cross-sectional surveys on adult literacy skills not only in Canada, but also in all other countries where these surveys have been conducted.

中文翻译：

---

是否像我们认为的那样，对成人识字技能的大规模调查具有可比性？

最近的文献表明，在加拿大，美国，挪威和其他发达国家，较年轻的人群识字率较低。提供很少的解释来证明这种负面队列效应的存在。然而，这种下降对经济，教育系统和社会产生了严重影响。在本文中，我们将重点放在加拿大，并使用相同的方法（合成队列）复制文献中发表的结果。我们使用来自成人技能调查的相同数据，即国际成人识字调查（IALS），成人识字和生活技能调查（ALL）以及经合组织国际成人评估计划的成人技能调查。能力（PIAAC）。第二，我们进行了进一步的分析，以更好地了解时间对成人识字技能的影响。然后，我们证明年龄对识字分数有负面影响，但只有一次调查中用来衡量识字技能的工具发生变化，才能说明明显的“时期”效应（或更确切地说是“调查”效应）到另一个。本文表明，文献中提到的负面队列效应可能是谬误的，因为如果省略了用于测量仪器失真的控件，则会加剧这种负面效应。本文有助于提高有关年龄和队列对加拿大成人识字率的影响的知识。结果削弱了明显的负面队列效应的观念；实际上，这种影响很大一部分是由一种无法比拟的方法引起的，该方法在最近的调查周期中系统地为个人分配了较低的分数。这些发现很重要，因为它们突显了使用合成队列方法进行横断面调查的成人分析技能的局限性，不仅在加拿大，而且在进行过这些调查的所有其他国家/地区也是如此。