Gender inequality in adult education: a comparative study of four adult learning systems

Abstract

This study explores gender-related inequality in participation in Adult Education and Training (AET) in four countries with vastly different adult learning systems and support measures for women’s AET. Our examination of the data from an original international survey conducted in 2022 has found that the participation of men and women clearly differs among types of AET. Despite the frequently reported equal gender participation rates, the presented findings show that men participate more in job-related and employer-sponsored non-formal education (NFE), while women manage to develop more general skills in non-job-related and non-employer-sponsored NFE. Furthermore, our findings reveal that the primary reasons for participation in NFE are remarkably similar between men and women and, therefore, cannot be used as a source of explanation for different participation patterns. In addition, the extent of gender inequality in job-related and employer-sponsored NFE across countries exhibits minimal variation. All this implies that countries with vastly different adult learning systems currently display a degree of similarity in gender inequality regarding NFE, which could be determined more by characteristics of the labor market than the welfare regime.