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Adult Educational Psychology: The Interface between Adult

Learning, Development, and Education
M Cecil Smith
Northern Illinois University
September 1, 1998
Unpublished manuscript.
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Adult Educational Psychology: The Interface between Adult
Learning, Development, and Education
Although the characteristics and qualities of adult development are increasingly of
interest to developmental psychologists, and to adult educators, only recently have educational
psychologists devoted much attention to adults. This is due, primarily, to the large numbers of
adults who are pursuing continuing education and training--whether due to occupational
demands, avocational interests, or because--on average--adults are living longer, healthier lives.
This trend, combined with an increasingly earlier retirement and greater leisure time available to
adults, have combined to send adults back to school--not just in formal educational settings,
but through a variety of alternatives.
While adult educators have grappled with understanding the most effective ways to
provide instruction to adult learners, who vary greatly in their learning needs, interests, and
abilities, these practitioners can undoubtedly benefit from a greater understanding of the
psychology of learning and development, as applied to educational contexts. Educational
psychologists are uniquely qualified to provide this kind of information to practitioners.
Adult education has been called a developmental enterprise, in that adult education is said
to promote the development of adults in a variety of domains--cognitive and intellectual, social
and emotional. Still, there is very little evidence that adult educators are well-versed in
developmental principles and that adult education does, in fact, serve to promote development.
Two Domains of Theory and Research
Traditionally, there are two domains of theory and research in adult development,
according to Tennant & Pogson (1995): intellectual and cognitive development comprises one
domain--and will be an emphasis of this course; personality and social development comprises
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the second domain of research and theorizing. While the study of personality development in
adulthood is important to a broader understanding of the impacts of adult education on
adulthood, this has occupied less attention from adult educators. Adult social development
through education has, however, been of much greater interest to adult educators.
In regards to adult intellectual development, two descriptive models have predominated
in the literature: the stability model and the decrement model, according to Tennant and Pogson
(1995). The stability model assumes that adult cognition remains essentially the same after
maturity, with no qualitative or quantitative growth. The decrement model, on the other hand,
assumes that there is a gradual decrease in the persons ability to utilize and organize information
(likely due to biological deterioration of the cognitive system with age). Peak intellectual
functioning, from this perspective, occurs in the late 20s/early 30s.
Because of the influence of the life span developmental perspective over the past 25 years
(Baltes, 1987), an alternative model has replaced both the stability and the decrement
perspectives on cognitive aging. This new model suggests that there is increasing cognitive
ability with age. Because adults are faced with a variety of socially determined problem-solving
situations--at work, in the community, at home and in the family--there are multiple
opportunities to exercise and improve ones cognitive and intellectual abilities. These kinds of
socially defined problems rarely are found on the paper-and-pencil tests of intellectual
functioning that are typically used in cognitive aging research.
Also, even more traditional theorists have modified their perspectives in regards to adult
intellectual abilities--particularly those working from the cognitive developmental perspective of
Piaget. Piaget, of course, argued that intellectual development reached its zenith with the full
attainment of formal operations in late adolescence, and no further growth is possible, save for
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some specialization in areas of interest to the individual. Formal operations, however, pertains to
only one dimension of adult thinking, that is, logical-mathematical and scientific reasoning.
But most problems in adult life have little to do with formal logical or mathematical
thinking, but are more often fuzzy, open-ended sorts of problems and issues within the social and
interpersonal domains. Other forms of reasoning may, therefore, be equally or more important.
Thus, a number of so-called post-formal models of adult thinking have been proposed over the
past 25 years, including Labouvie-Vief (1980), Rybash, Hoyer & Roodin (1986); Riegel (1973),
and Basseches (1984). Such models recognize the significance of real-life experience in
problem-solving.
The Role of the Self in Learning
I previously noted that this course focuses primarily on adult cognitive development,
rather than social and personality development in adulthood. However, we would be remiss if we
didnt devote some attention to several theories and theorists that have been significant to adult
educators and researchers concerned with adult learning. These theorists have been primarily
interested in describing various age-related stages, or phases, of self- and/or personality
development over the course of adulthood. The theorists include Erik Erikson (1963), Daniel
Levinson (1978), and George Vaillant (1977). Their ideas are significant to adult educators
because they tend to agree that the development of personality and social roles have origins in
social practices, rather than innate psychological processes (Tennant & Pogson, 1995). Adult
education, obviously, consists of a set of social practices that can, and do, operate to shape the
development of the person in a variety of ways.
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Some Areas of Concern Regarding Relationships Between Adult Educators and Educational
Psychologists
It is interesting to note that adult educators have, traditionally, been interested in
understanding the different styles or modes of learning that adults demonstrate--much more so
than they have been in understanding or assessing cognitive and intellectual abilities. This has
taken place despite the fact that the psychological research fails to find compelling evidence for
quantitative--as opposed to qualitative--differences in these learning styles. There is no evidence to
support some adult educators claims that instruction which is designed to capitalize upon an
individuals preferred manner of learning (sometimes called attribute X treatment interaction, or
ATI research) has any benefit over and above traditional group-oriented approaches to teaching
(Cronbach & Snow, 1977).
Educational psychologists have traditionally studied learning and instruction as these
activities and processes occur in K-12 classroom and schools. Their work has resulted in a
number of psychological and instructional principles in regards to cause-effect relationships
between teaching and learning. Because the best place to establish such relationships is in the
laboratory, where many extraneous variables can be controlled or eliminated, educational
psychologists work has rarely been viewed as applicable to adult education, with its focus on
authentic learning for real-world application. In fairness, however, it must be said that, over the
past generation or more, educational psychologists have returned to the classroom and have
investigated a number of variables pertinent to learning, such as teacher expertise (Leinhardt,
1989), the effects of students prior knowledge (Glaser, 1984), and motivation (Pintrich &
DeGroot, 1990). A laboratory is not the real world with all of its inherent messiness, and so,
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adult educators have been reluctant to apply the principles derived from decades of educational
psychology research with young learners to the teaching of adults.
The result of this state of affairs is that adult educators and educational psychologists
rarely travel in the same circles. They dont attend the same professional conferences and they
dont read the same journals. They rarely collaborate on research--although there is much
evidence that both professions would benefit from such interactions.
For one thing, adult educators are loathe to assume that the teacher necessarily knows
more than does the adult student, which is a fundamental assumption of pedagogy. The adult
educator is often viewed as a facilitator of learning rather than as one who imparts knowledge
and facts to a passive adult learner (what Malcolm Knowles, 1984, called andragogy). However,
the traditional view of the active teacher-passive learner in regards to childhood education has
fallen out of favor with the emergence--and dominance--of constructivist (neo-Piagetian models)
and social-constructivist (i.e., Vygotsky) perspectives on learning and instruction in educational
psychology over the past two decades. Thus, there may be some areas of common ground
between adult educators and educational psychologists.
Still, as adult educators have often pointed out, psychologists have generally been more
concerned with understanding the average or typical performance of a group of learners
rather than focusing on the phenomenological experience of the individual learner. And,
historically, psychologists have rarely studied women, minorities, and members of socially-
disenfranchised groups (although this has changed over the past 25 years or so)--the very groups
that are of most interest to adult educators (see: Miles Hortons Highlander Folk School,
http://www.hrec.org ; also, Freire, 1970).
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Despite these differences in emphasis, there is a lot of evidence that adult educators and
educational psychologists can benefit from working together. Tennent and Pogson (1995)
suggest that there are essentially three fundamental concerns of adult educators. These concerns
are to:
-acknowledge the (life) experience of learners;
-establish an adult teacher-adult learner relationship
-promote the autonomy and self-direction of the adult learner.
No contemporary educational psychologist would suggest that the learner (at any age)
comes into the learning situation as a blank slate given the impact of the social environment on
the individual. Among the important questions, for the educational psychologist, are:
-What life experiences are most relevant to learning?
-How does a learners prior knowledge affect their current learning?
-How can instruction be conducted in order to capitalize upon the learners relevant
experiences?
Few adult educational psychologists would ignore the role of the relationship between the
teacher and student in the instructional situation. The teachers ability to motivate the student, the
students sense of attraction to the teacher, the establishment of mutual trust (the teacher will
teach, the student will learn)--all are relevant aspects of relationship to the educational
psychologist. Finally, adult educational psychologists are also concerned with how individual
autonomy and self-direction (achievement motivation) can best be fostered through effective
teaching.
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References
Baltes, P.B. (1987). Theoretical propositions of life-span developmental psychology: On the
dynamics between growth and decline. Developmental Psychology, 23, 611-626.
Basseches, M. (1984). Dialectical thinking and adult development. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Cronbach, L.J., & Snow, R.E. (1977). Aptitudes and instructional methods. New York:
Irvington.
Erikson, E.H. (1950). Childhood and society. New York: W.W. Norton.
Freire, P. (1973). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Seabury Press.
Glaser, R. (1984). Education and thinking: The role of knowledge. American Psychologist, 39,
93-104.
Knowles, M. (1980). The adult learner: A neglected species. Houston: Gulf.
Labouvie-Vief, G. (1980). Beyond formal operations: Uses and limits of pure logic in life span
development. Human Development, 23, 141-161.
Leinhardt, G. (1989). Math lessons: A contrast of novice and expert competence. Journal for
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Levinson, D., & Associates. (1978). Seasons of a mans life. New York: Ballantine.
Pintrich, P., & DeGroot, E. (1990). Motivational and self-regulated learning components of
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Riegel, K. (1973). Dialectics: The final period of cognitive development. Human Development,
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Rybash, J.M., Hoyer, W., & Roodin, P. (1986). Adult cognition and aging. New York:
Pergamon.
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Tennant, M., & Pogson, P. (1995). Learning and change in the adult years. San Francisco:
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Vaillant, G. (1977). Adaptation to life. Boston: Little, Brown Co.