General description:

Participation in Adult Basic Education (ABE) tends to be rather low in European countries, even if several European studies on reading and writing competencies of adults reveal bigger proportions of low performers in adult literacy, e.g. the British ‘Skills for Life study’ (Department for Business, 2011), the French ‘Information et Vie Quotidienne study’ (Jonas, 2012) and the German ‘leo.-Level-One study’ (Grotlüschen & Riekmann, 2012). As an international comparison the PIAAC-survey showed a significant degree of adults with low basic skills (Literacy, Numeracy, ICT) in most of the participating OECD countries (OECD, 2013). In contrast to these results the low rates of participation in ABE (von Hippel/Tippelt 2009) evoke the question how to reach more participants for reading and writing classes. For example, in Germany only 20,000 people are enrolled in reading and writing courses on alphabetization in adult education centers, this is not more than 0,3% of the population affected (Rosenbladt 2011).
But so far only participants of ABE classes or the staff working in the education centers have been questioned about the problem. Social networks of the functional illiterates – their partners or confidantes – never get it in the middle of the research, although it is well-known that they play a major role in lifelong learning. The study “supporters of adult low performers in literacy” does not address the low performers themselves but the people who form their supporting network and who help them manage everyday life. The study explores the role of the partners and supporters regarding the relevance of education for the low performers in literacy. Its results might also inspire similar research in other European countries.

Theoretical framework
The study is based on different theoretical approaches.
1.    Biographical research shows that low performers in literacy do have at least one supporter: spouse, children, or friends (Döbert/Hubertus 2000). Why do the confidantes support their friend, spouse, or other? Do they encourage them to improve their skills or do they, on the contrary, hinder them from learning?
2.    The New Literacy Studies explain that literacy should not be interpreted as a fixed set of skills but that literacy strongly depends from the social contexts in which a person is located (Barton, Hamilton, & Ivanič, 2004). This perspective helps to explain why a large number of low performers in literacy do come along in everyday life, because they might not be confronted with too much literacy challenges.
3.    Research on social capital (Bourdieu, 1983) helps to explain the importance of supporters who might act as gatekeepers towards adult basic education. This perspective is sharpened by the distinction between bridging and bonding social capital by Putnam (Putnam, 2001).
4.    A fourth theoretical basis is formed by research on networks of support. Whereas research on networks in the context pedagogy in Germany is quite rare (Berkemeyer, Bos, & Holtappels, 2010), there is a number of older (Fingeret, 1983) and younger studies (Hodge, Barton, & Pearce, 2010) on these aspects.

Research Questions
The study intends to find out in which social spaces knowledge about the low skills of the people exists (family, employment, neighborhood et al.) and what kind of relationship the supporters have with the low performers (e.g. at what point does the role of a supporter might become a burden).
A main objective is to develop a set of different types of supporters in order to describe the specific forms of support they offer and in order to work out how these different types could be addressed by ABE.
And because supporters could be described as informal counsellors in the specific dyad it should be answered which information confidantes need in order to stimulate learning activities.

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