Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides a critical account of those psychological theories which have informed contemporary adult education theory and practice. It also provides a balance of description, critique and comments on each theory’s influence, potential or actual, on adult education. The book presents an emphasis on understanding self-formation throughout the lifespan. Adult education is seen as a vehicle for explicitly addressing significant social issues connected to areas such as the environment, race, health, gender, class, the aged, the unemployed, and the dislocation and exploitation of migrants. The book argues that many of the prevailing theories in psychology and adult education attempt the impossible – a grand theory of adult learning and development, which is best understood as a process subject to the vagaries of historical and social variation.