Measuring Skills in Developing Countries

Rachid Laaja and Karen Macours

Journal of Human Resources, 2021, vol. 56, issue 4, 1254-1295

Abstract: Measures of cognitive, noncognitive, and technical skills are increasingly used in surveys in developing countries, but have mostly been validated in high-income countries. We use a survey experiment in Western Kenya to test the reliability and validity of commonly used skills measures. Cognitive skills measures are found to be reliable and internally consistent, technical skills are very noisy, and measurement error in noncognitive skills is found to be nonclassical. Addressing both random and systematic measurement error using common psychometric practices and repeated measures leads to some improvements and clearer predictions, though concerns remain. These findings hold for a replication in Colombia.

JEL-codes: O12 O13 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
Note: DOI: 10.3368/jhr.56.4.1018-9805R1
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
http://jhr.uwpress.org/cgi/reprint/56/4/1254
A subscription is required to access pdf files. Pay per article is available.

Related works:
Working Paper: Measuring Skills in Developing Countries (2021)
Working Paper: Measuring Skills in Developing Countries (2021)
Working Paper: Measuring Skills in Developing Countries (2018)
Working Paper: Measuring skills in developing countries (2017)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uwp:jhriss:v:56:y:2021:i:4:p:1254-1295

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Human Resources from University of Wisconsin Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().