Today's sociopolitical and economic conditions require adults to engage in informed, culturally sensitive coexistence. Correspondingly, adult educators need to design experiences that help prepare learners for cross-cultural collaboration and socially responsible careers in a global age. Framed through cosmopolitanism and situated learning…

In work-related instrumental learning contexts, the role of reflective activities is unclear. Kolb's experiential learning theory and Mezirow's transformative learning theory predict skill adaptation as an outcome. This prediction was tested by manipulating reflective activities and assessing participants' response and error rates…

Adult learners comprise a significant portion of current undergraduate populations, and projections indicate steady or growing numbers of adult learners in the future. Previous research has suggested that adult learners possess lower self-confidence than and face barriers not experienced by traditional undergraduate students. These constructs have…

Intentionally designing international perspectives into adult educator preparation programs is a step toward developing instructors' social and instructional cache of understandings about learning, knowledge, and facilitative methodologies that transcend their own Western cultural influences. In a class offered through an MA in adult learning…

In 2008, the Commission of Professors of Adult Education approved and published "Standards for Graduate Programs in Adult Education," an update of the 1986 "Standards." Using the program websites of the 37 North American programs ascertained to have doctoral programs in the field, this study evaluated all programs' course descriptions for…

This historical study identifies catalysts for transformative learning in the lives of three scientist-environmentalists important to the 20th-century environmental movement: Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, and David Suzuki. Following a brief review of theoretical perspectives on transformative learning, the article argues that transformative…

This article explores the relationships among student-centered doctoral study for scholar-practitioners, adult development, and transformative learning. In this research study, the authors describe a project that explores an expanded conceptualization of doctoral education that is grounded in an integrative perspective on adult development and on…

The purpose of this study was to develop a reliable and valid instrument to measure self-directedness in learning among college students based on an operationalization of the personal responsibility orientation (PRO) model of self-direction in learning. The resultant 25-item Personal Responsibility Orientation to Self-Direction in Learning Scale…

The article takes as a case study a group of disability rights activists who were given access to a master's program via Recognition of Prior Learning. The question explored is "Can adult learners' prior experiential knowledge act as a resource for the successful acquisition of postgraduate academic literacy practices?" The analysis is framed…

Two collaborative writing partners sought to deepen their understanding of transformative learning by conducting several spirals of grounded theory research on their own collaborative relationship. Drawing from adult education, business, and social science literature and including descriptive analysis of their records of activity and interaction…

Collaborative/cooperative inquiry (CI) is both a method for engaging in new paradigm human inquiry and a strategy for facilitating adult learning. Adult educators who use CI in institutional settings must be aware of potential corrupting influences. The authors alert educators to three factors interjected by institutional affiliation that…

This paper examines dialogue in the higher education classroom. Instigated by my teaching experiences and the paucity of empirical studies examining dialogue in the higher education classroom, I present a re-examination of data I collected in 1996 for an ethnographic study focusing on the experiences of the participants in an ethnic literature…

Adult undergraduate student identities at research extensive universities were uniquely coconstructed, shaped by this selective and competitive youth-oriented cultural context. Drawing upon social constructivist theory, this study explored this coconstruction through positional and relational adult student identities. Positional identities were…

Synthesising Martha Nussbaum's study of the emotions and the capabilities approach to human development with Charles Taylor's claim that authentic identities ought to be constructed dialogically against "horizons of significance," the author identifies critical features of authenticity that are then applied to the context of adult educators,…

As the number of nontraditional-age students grows on college campuses, it is essential for higher education practitioners to understand if and how older students, especially women, become and remain engaged in their education. A review of the educational engagement literature reveals images of disengaged adult learners whose work and family…