Lifelong learning 2008-2015

The purpose of this report is to present descriptive statistics from the Learning Conditions Monitor (Lærevilkårsmonitoren), a supplementary survey to the Labour Force Survey (LFS) running in the first quarter each year. The purpose of the Learning Conditions Monitor is to investigate factors that influence adult learning opportunities. The results described in this report are from the period 2008 to 2015.

The survey has a net sample of about 12 000 respondents aged 15 to 66 years, and questions include a mapping of respondents’ participation in formal education and non-formal education and training in the past 12 months.

Almost seven out of ten persons employed have work requiring them to continuously learn new things, and almost eight out of ten say they have good learning opportunities in their job. Around three out of five employees face high demands to learn new things in their daily work combined with good opportunities for such learning. This combination of high learning requirements and good learning opportunities can be described as learning-intensive work. 

42 percent aged 15 to 66 years (i.e. just under 1.5 million people) participated in non-formal education and training in the past year. Non-formal education and training is commonly job-related, and the proportion who participate is far higher among employed than among non-employed. The employer is often the provider of such non-formal education and training. Individuals with tertiary educational attainment, and people in academic professions or management positions, participate in non-formal education and training to a larger extent than others.

Approximately nine percent of employed adults over 25 years (i.e. 200 000 people) studied in the formal education system in the last 12 months. Employed women participate to a larger extent than employed men, both in the age group 25-34 years and 35 years and above.