Relationships Between Computer and Information Literacy, Computational Thinking, and Student Background

This chapter explores the association between student achievement in computer and information literacy (CIL) and computational thinking (CT) and various student background characteristics, including gender, immigration background, socioeconomic status, and home computer resources. It documents the differences in achievement between groups classified according to the various background characteristics, noting that differences can be observed between groups for all characteristics. However, the magnitude of these differences-and in some cases, the direction-vary across countries and by characteristic. Results from the International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) 2023 reveal that gender differences depend on the domain. In most countries, female students scored higher in CIL than male students. In contrast, significant differences in favor of male students in CT was observed in only six of 22 countries. In most, but not all countries, students without an immigrant background achieved significantly higher CIL and CT scores than students with an immigrant background. However, a handful of countries presented the opposite pattern. In all participating countries, differences in CIL and CT based on measures of socioeconomic status and home computer resources were significant in favor of students from higher socioeconomic backgrounds and homes with greater ICT resources.