The last decades have seen an unprecedented growth in the availability and accessibility of data, highly influenced by the ubiquity of digital media and the internet. As society contends with data's increasing impact on the nature of knowledge, communication, and privacy, it faces a pressing need for citizens who are intelligent producers and cautious consumers of this data. This in turn requires situating data literacy at the center of lifelong learning, developing more consistent approaches for helping novices learn the language of data, and equipping the public to think critically and ethically about how and why data are being used (Deahl, 2014; Pangrazio & Selwyn, 2019). An important first step is defining data literacy. This work is grounded in a definition of data literacy as comprising the skills, attitudes, and beliefs needed as "critical and reflective citizens" in the 21st century (Francois, Monteiro, & Allo, 2020). Noting a discrepancy between a research focus on data as social justice and individual experience of data literacy as a set of skills, I argue for a need to approach data literacy education from both a competency perspective AND an empowerment perspective (Gebre, 2018), as well as from a resource perspective. I outline a mixed-method study exploring how conceptions of data literacy manifest across middle school students, high school students, undergraduates, and adults, and detail the creation and validation of an instrument designed to measure data literacy in adults. The instrument was designed to explore the unidimensionality of the data literacy construct. Data collected from a total of 700 participants was analyzed using exploratory factor analysis and fit to an Item Response Theory model. The analysis suggested that, rather than a single unidimensional construct, data literacy is multidimensional and composed of facets that are related to one another yet remain distinct. The instrument identified four factors of data literacy: Skills, Awareness of Data and its Limitations, Appreciation of Data, and Data Self-Efficacy. A confirmatory factor analysis supports this structure with a CFI of 0.990. Chronbach's Alpha for the skills factor was 0.71 and the omega coefficient for the attitudes and beliefs factors was 0.96.A key contribution of this work is the development of a Data Literacy Awareness-Action Typology mapping the relationship between an individual's awareness of data and their actions relating to personal data management. The typology highlights that awareness and action don't increase in tandem and offers a new perspective on how students might progress in their development of data literacy, suggesting the design of data literacy interventions that support students in aligning data awareness and action. The paper concludes with recommendations for researchers and practitioners to strengthen data literacy educational pathways. In particular, the findings point to the importance of bringing awareness to a broader definition of data, helping students recognize the wide role that data plays in their lives, and amplifying data literacy as empowerment to cultivate a sense of agency in when and how individuals can choose to act in engaging with their personal data. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com.bibliotheek.ehb.be/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]