Young peoples’ perceptions of digital, media and information literacies across Europe: gender differences, and the gaps between attitudes and abilities

Abstract

The need to develop digital, media and information literacies in young people is not a new idea. Increasing numbers of regional, national and international policies make the case and offer frameworks for such literacy development in schools. However, there is still no common agreement about what a basic level of literacy might look like across or within countries, resulting in what UNESCO described as a serious knowledge gap about the global state of digital literacy skills of youth. This article reports on the empirical findings derived from a self-assessment tool, providing a comprehensive view of these literacies in 13–18-year-old students (n = 1051) across eight countries in Europe. This article offers a significant contribution to the field, identifying gender differences and specific differences in ‘attitude minus ability’ scores relating to plagiarism and critical awareness of sources. This has implications for teaching and curriculum development across Europe.