To satisfy federal requirements, the National Center for Education Statistics and the Division of Adult Education and Literacy planned a nationally representative household sample survey to assess the literacy skills of the adult population of the United States, to be conducted by the Educational Testing Service with the assistance of Westat, Inc. This report describes the development of the National Adult Literacy Survey framework, the development of the background questionnaire, the development of simulation tasks, state adult literacy surveys, and participants in the development process. Results from the survey will provide policymakers and others with information on the condition of literacy in the United States. The field test was conducted in 1991, and the main data collection took place in 1992 with a sample of 14,900 adults aged 16 years and older living in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Black and Hispanic households were oversampled to ensure reliable estimates of their literacy proficiencies. Results will describe the literacy skills demonstrated by the total adult population as well as by adults comprising various sub-groups and will characterize these skills in terms of demographic and personal background information. Seven tables present information about the samples. An appendix of sample tasks contains some of the prose, document, and quantitative tasks adults were asked to complete. (SLD)