Skills that Matter for Success and Well-being in Adulthood

"This report examines how social and emotional skills are distributed across the adult population, and how they influence key life outcomes beyond the impact of the cognitive skills measured in the survey, such as literacy. The results highlight the importance of social and emotional skills in shaping adults’ success in work and life. While cognitive skills remain key determinants of labour market outcomes, social and emotional skills independently contribute to employment, wages and job satisfaction. They are also positively related to educational attainment, health, well-being and civic participation. Moreover, these skills vary across socio-demographic groups, including differences by age, gender, parental education and immigrant background. Drawing on this evidence, the report discusses policy options to promote social and emotional learning throughout the life course, emphasising its value in supporting adults as workers, learners and active citizens."

OECD (2025), Skills that Matter for Success and Well-being in Adulthood: Evidence on Adults' Social and Emotional Skills from the 2023 Survey of Adult Skills, OECD Skills Studies, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/6e318286-en .

https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/publications/reports/2025/10/skills-that-matter-for-success-and-well-being-in-adulthood_10222f2b/6e318286-en.pdf

Adults from less educated families report, on average, lower openness to experience
The results of the 2023 Survey of Adults Skills confirm that parental educational attainment influences social and emotional skills well into adulthood (Figure 4.6). The analysis compares two groups of adults: those who have at least one parent who has attained tertiary education (adults with highly educated parents) with those whose parents have attained upper secondary education at most (adults with lower-educated parents). The results indicate that adults with highly educated parents demonstrate, on average, higher levels of openness to experience across all participating countries and economies. Similar differences are observed for extraversion in all countries and economies, except Canada, Chile, Czechia,
Italy, New Zealand and Portugal, where no significant differences are observed. In 12 countries and economies, emotional stability is also positively related to parental education.
Different patterns emerge for the Big Five domains conscientiousness and agreeableness.

In most countries and economies, adults with lower-educated parents report, on average, higher levels of conscientiousness than those with highly educated parents. Exceptions are Chile, Croatia, Estonia, Finland, Italy, Israel, Poland and the Slovak Republic, where the difference is not significant, and Lithuania, where adults from advantaged backgrounds report higher average levels of conscientiousness.
In Canada, England (United Kingdom), France, Ireland, Korea and Norway, adults with lower-educated parents score, on average, somewhat higher in agreeableness then adults with highly educated parents. In the remaining countries and economies, there is no significant difference between the groups, while in Austria and the Flemish Region (Belgium), the reversed pattern is observed.
https://www.oecd.org/en/about/programmes/piaac/piaac-data.html