Language skills differences between adults without formal education and low formal education

Abstract

Background The influence of education on cognition has been extensively researched, particularly in countries with high levels of illiteracy. However, the impact of low education in all cognitive functions appears to differ. Regarding to language, the effects of education on many linguistic tasks—supported by different processing—remain unclear. The primary objective of this study was to determine whether oral language task performance differs among individuals with no formal and low-educated subjects, as measured by the Brazilian Montreal-Toulouse Language Assessment Battery (MTL-BR). This is the only language battery available for use in Brazil, but lacks normative data for illiterate individuals. The secondary objective was to gather data for use as clinical parameters in assessing persons with aphasia (PWA) not exposed to a formal education. Methods A total of 30 healthy illiterate individuals aged 34–60 years were assessed. All participants underwent the MTL-BR Battery, excluding its written communication tasks. The data obtained in the present study were compared against results of a previous investigation of individuals with 1–4 years of education evaluated using the same MTL-BR instrument. Results Statistically significant differences in performance were found between non-formal education and the low-educated (2–4 years) groups on the tasks Auditory Comprehension, Repetition, Orthographic/Phonological Fluency, Number dictation, Reading of numbers and also on simple numerical calculations. Conclusion The study results showed that individuals with no formal education/illiterate had worse performance than low-education individuals on some of the language tasks of the MTL-Br Battery, suggesting that each year of education impacts cognitive-language performance. Also, data were obtained which can serve as a guide for PWA not exposed to a formal education.

Assessing the Role of Formal Education in Promoting Entrepreneurship

“…It also acts as a foundation for labor organization and systematic societal functioning (Slabko et al, 2019). The upsurge in formal education can be ascribed to macroeconomic conditions and a rising pace of learning, which results in a larger return on education and motivates learners to stay in school for longer periods of time (Pereira & Ortiz, 2022;Slabko et al, 2019). In the 1950s, formal education for females tried to educate them for both domestication and employment, mirroring society's gendered standards.…”