Friday, November 1 2019, Ester van Laar successfully defended her dissertation entitled “What are E-ssential skills? A multimethod approach to 21st-century digital skills within the creative industries”. She received her doctorate degree ‘Cum Laude’.
Ester van Laar conducted her research in the research group Communication Science, under the supervision of professors Alexander van Deursen (UT), Jan van Dijk (UT) and Jos de Haan (SCP).
About the research
To understand the consequences of digitization in terms of individual workers’ skills, the term 21st-century digital skills is introduced. The focus is on the following core skills: information management, communication, collaboration, critical thinking, creativity and problem solving. The essence is what workers can do with ICTs to support a broad spectrum of 21st-century skills and in turn take full advantage of ICTs. A main contribution is made to the concept of 21st-century digital skills by clarifying, operationalizing and testing its value within the creative industries.
Besides the interdisciplinary conceptual and operational elaboration of 21st-century digital skills, the significance of these skills is demonstrated by applying a multimethod research approach. Furthermore, this dissertation discusses potential causes of differential skills at the level of the individual worker.
The complete dissertation can be found on: https://research.utwente.nl/en/publications/what-are-e-ssential-skills-a-multimethod-approach-to-21st-century
