Third-Party Funded Projects

Non-Pecuniary Benefits of Continuous Education: Civic Participation

Team:  Prof. Dr. Stephan L. Thomsen, Dr. Jens Ruhose
Year:  2016
Date:  31-01-19
Funding:  Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF)
Duration:  February 2016 - January 2019
Is Finished:  yes

Civic participation, which means the participation in cultural, social, and political activities, is important for the development of the individual, but also a prerequisite for the functioning of a democratic society. Educational pathways have their foundation early in life and are strongly affected by regular and vocational schooling. Those educational pathways require continuous adaption and learning processes. As a central research question in this project, we investigate whether participating in continuous education that takes place after regular and vocational schooling is finished leads to higher civic participation. The project relies in particular on data from the German Socioeconomic Panel Study (GSOEP), data from the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), as well as on different cross-sectional datasets. We use modern empirical microeconometric methods to make causal statements about the relationship between the participation in continuous education and civic participation.

Cooperation Partner: Deutsches Institut für Erwachsenenbildung (DIE), Bonn; Soziologisches Forschungsinstitut (SOFI), Göttingen; Georg-August-Universität Göttingen; Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen