Research Possibilities of Self-Directed Learning

Abstract

Self-directed learning as a topic began to become known to experts in the field of adult education in the 1960s. As well at that time, its relatively intensive research begins. The purpose of this text is to map the methods used in the empirical study of self-directed learning. For this purpose, the analysis of empirically focused articles published in the journal that is the only one specializing in the issue, the International Journal of Self-Directed Learning, was carried out, and two other journals Adult Education Quarterly (AEQ) and International Journal of Lifelong Education (IJLE). The result of the analysis of a total of 99 empirically focused texts published in the above mentioned journal is the basic overview of instruments that can be used in the study of self-directed learning, namely (a) in both quantitative and qualitative research design and (b) in the study of self-directed learning as a process and self-direction as a an attribute of a personality.