How living or traveling to foreign locations influences adults’ worldviews and impacts personal identity

Abstract

People are living and traveling to places all over the world. An exploration of how this movement influences learners’ worldviews has implications for adult development, identity, and learning. The purpose of this paper is to present a phenomenological study conducted in the U.S. that examined how individuals’ living or traveling experiences in different countries influenced their worldviews and impacted their personal identity. Study findings indicate that these experiences influenced their worldviews by changing, confirming, or broadening their personal beliefs, often simultaneously, about their own and other cultures and impacted their identity development. By living or traveling to foreign locations participants increased their awareness of multiple worldviews through trigger events and numerous experiences, or building blocks, throughout their lives. These experiences influenced their perceptions of international issues and fostered a transnational identity. Our findings expand on the adult education literature related to adult development, learning, and transnational identity by suggesting that building blocks of experiences can be perceived and processed by each individual in unique ways.