Participation In Adult Education Research Articles

Mandatory Continuing Education for Professionals: Trends and Issues

Voluntarism, historically a fundamental principle and characteristic of adult education, is at risk with the development of mandated continuing professional education. Education is mandated by (1) direct regulation in state licensure laws; (2) indirect regulation through professional membership, employment requirements, and specialized certificates; and (3) informal social sanctions. While there are some signs of a halt in direct regulation, indirect and informal controls are on the upsurge, typically in order to avert threatened external regulation. Central is the concern for competence, which reflects broader social concerns with accountability, as well as a new moralism with respect to adult education participation. Economic incentives for continuing education providers are also an important factor. One outcome is the formalization of control as manifest in efforts to measure learning outcomes and the development of accreditation standards. More professionals are challenging the quality of mandated offerings and their potential in meeting accountability concerns.

Development of a Thurstone Scale for Measuring Attitudes Toward Adult Education

This study reports the development of a Thurstone Scale to measure attitudes toward adult education. Fifty-four expert judges assigned ratings to 116 items in an item pool. Forty items met the criteria for inclusion in the scale and the method of successive intervals was used to calculate the scale item values. The validity of the scale was assessed against five criterion variables in a study in which 28 of the scale items were used with a sample of 263 adult patients in the medical practice of a family physician. Scores on the attitude scale were correlated with years of schooling, social participation, socio-economic status, internal-external locus of control and participation in adult learning activities. Although small in magnitude the correlation coefficients obtained were all in the anticipated direction and were statistically significant beyond the .01 level supporting the concurrent validity of the scale in the study. The homogeneity of the 40 scale items was tested by factor analysis of responses from 338 adult education participants. The analysis yielded nine factors accounting for 75.1 per cent of the variance and indicated that attitudes toward adult education, as quantified by the scale, are multifactorial. Second order factor analysis revealed three underlying factors with one dominant factor emerging.

ADULTS’ MOTIVATIONS FOR ATTENDING A COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Motivational orientations of adults for enrolling in community college courses are assessed by means of the Educational Participation Scale. Findings are related to the literature on adult participation in education, and comparisons are drawn between adults and traditional college students and across various demographic variables. Analysis was accomplished using prinicpal components factor analysis and multiple regression. Learning for learning's sake, occupational advancement, and humanitarian concerns were major influences on participation for adults and traditional age students. Demographic variables were found to have minimal association with motivational orientations. Relationships to the literature are described and recommendations are made for curriculum and student development programming.

Researching Participation in Adult Education: The Potential of the Qualitative Perspective

Current research on participation is critiqued in terms of problems in exact measurement, superimposed definitions, and the use of value-laden constructs. Building upon the thesis that the qualitative and quantitative approaches to research represent different perspectives, they are compared in terms of purpose, their interpretations, premises, focus, method, and research criteria, including reliability and validity. The qualitative perspective, particularly as influenced by hermeneutics and social phenomenology, is developed further and implications for the study of participation are considered. Emphasis is placed upon the importance of understanding the meaning of participation in the life-world of the individual. Educational participation is considered within the broader context of learning, and learning is viewed as embedded in the life-world.

Differences in Motivation of Adult and Younger Undergraduates

Adults in their twenties, thirties, forties, and older have enrolled in increasing numbers in higher education institutions as the number of traditional age students has declined. Colleges and universities that were once filled with youths are now actively recruiting the adult population to make up the enrollment deficit caused by declining numbers of youth who either do not exist or are developing career lines that do not include traditional higher education. If these adult learners are to be adequately served, institutions of higher education must assess their needs and motivations, understand the differences between adult learners and the traditional age college student, and make appropriate adjustment in administrative procedures, programming, and the teaching-learning process. The motivation of adults to seek learning has been researched in recent years. Houle [7] interviewed twenty-two adult learners and derived three learner types from that sample. They were identified as goal oriented, activity oriented, and learning oriented. In a national survey Johnstone and Rivera [8] reported relationships between demographic variables such as age, sex, and socioeconomic status and the reasons for enrolling in some kind of organized learning experience. More recently, Cross [6] reported the results of research conducted by the National Center for Educational Statistics, and related adult education participants' responses to demographic variables.

The Factors Affecting Participation in Adult Education: An Analysis of some Literature

(1981). The Factors Affecting Participation in Adult Education: An Analysis of some Literature. Studies in Adult Education: Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 98-111.

Some Insights into the Problem of Adult Education Participation in Nigeria

This study investigated the influence of selected positional and psychological factors on evening-class participants in two states in Nigeria: North-Central and North-Western states. * The study also described the motivational bases of their participation. It was regarded as necessary to duplicate this study and know whether or not the characteristics and motivation of participants in the two states are similar. This should be important to researchers since comparisons between two states might lead to valid generalisations. The practical value of this study is that it revealed some characteristics of the people who attend this kind of class. The exploration of the problem of participation at a multivariate level was suggested.

The Adult Part-Time Learner in Colleges and Universities: A Clientele Analysis

Using the 1975 National Center for Educational Statistics/Bureau of Census “Participation in Adult Education” survey data, this paper presents an analysis of part-time students at colleges and universities—who participates and who persists. Separate analyses of public two-year colleges and noncredit activities are also presented. The analysis is followed with a discussion of the implications. A general conclusion is that adult education at colleges and universities may rest on a precariously narrow base.

Effects of Fees On Clientele Characteristics and Participation in Adult Education

Fifty-nine adult education courses were randomly assigned to a fee and non-fee condition to establish the extent to which fee and non-fee courses attract different clientele. Seven hundred and twenty-one participants completed the Education Participation Scale and a questionnaire eliciting social and demographic data. Nearly 70 per cent of the participants enrolled in the non- fee courses. Participants were motivated by E.P.S. factors cognitive interest and escape stimula tion. The social, demographic and motivational profile of non-fee payers was similar to that of the fee-payers. In pursuit of variable configurations that explain fee-status (paying or not paying) a multi-variate AID3 analysis was run. With fee-status as the dependent variable the independent variables accounted for 35 per cent of the variance. It was concluded that mere removal of fees from leisure-centered adult education courses does not result in the attraction of participants who are significantly different from the middle-class participants traditionally attracted to such courses. The results are discussed within the framework of Miller's force-field analysis and Boshier's congruence model.

The adult part-time learner in colleges and universities: A clientele analysis

Using the 1975 National Center for Educational Statistics/Bureau of Census “Participation in Adult Education” survey data, this paper presents an analysis of part-time students at colleges and universities—who participates and who persists. Separate analyses of public two-year colleges and noncredit activities are also presented. The analysis is followed with a discussion of the implications. A general conclusion is that adult education at colleges and universities may rest on a precariously narrow base.

Adult Education Participation and Occupational Achievement: a Regression Analysis

Most research of adult education participation has focused on the causal antecedent of such participation rather than the factors which, in turn, might be influenced by adult education participation. Utilizing conventional techniques of path analysis, this study is an examination of the possible effects the adult educa tion participation of Mexican-American small businessmen, together with their formal educational attainment and work experience, have on their attitudinal and behavioral patterns of individual modernity, adoption of modern business practices, and their occupational achievement (meaured in terms of net business income). The analysis is based on data collected by interviews with 60 shopkeepers in the three most populous Mexican-American neighborhoods in Chicago during the summer and autumn of 1975. Findings indicated adult education participation contributed directly to higher levels of individual modernity and adoption of modern business practices and, via this latter variable, indirectly to occupational achievement.

Participation in Adult Education. Final Report, 1972. Imogene E. Okes, et al. National Center for Educational Statistics, U. S. Office of Education, Washington, D. C., 1976 (201 pp.). ED 136 003. Available only in MF, $.83 (plus postage)

Participation in Adult Education. Final Report, 1972. Imogene E. Okes, et al. National Center for Educational Statistics, U. S. Office of Education, Washington, D. C., 1976 (201 pp.). ED 136 003. Available only in MF, $.83 (plus postage)

EFFECTS OF AGE, SEX, AND STATUS ON PERCEPTION OF THE UTILITY OF EDUCATIONAL PARTICIPATION

This study investigated the influence of age, sex, and socioeconomic status on the perception of participants in adult education that their participation is useful. Two forms of utility were postulated: instrumental and expressive. An instrument containing scales of perceived utility, needs, goals, time orientation, and enjoyment was administered to selected classes at various educational institutions in the Chicago metropolitan area and, for comparison, a class in Florida. The results permitted inferences that needs, goals, and time orientation partially determine perception that participation is instrumentally useful and that age, status, and femaleness tend to favor perception of expressive utility. The findings supported previous research indicating that adult educational participation is complex behavior involving more than subject matter interests and motivational orientations and opened a new line of attack on the problem.

Can Adults Be Hooked on College?: Some Determinants of Adult College Attendance

This study examines institutional and individual determinants of adult participation in higher education. Using linear regression, we predicted the 1970 degree-credit college enrollment of a sample...

Motivational Orientations Re-Visited: Life-Space Motives and the Education Participation Scale

Continuing a line of motivational research that flows from Houle's three factor typology, a model which describes adult edu cation participants as life-chance (deficiency) or life-space (growth) oriented was presented. Life-chance motivation was hypothesized as being a principal determinant of the participation behavior of people from the lower socio-economic groups while life-space moti vation was said to characterize the upper socio-economic groups. Part of the model was tested with a parent population of 242 Van couver adult education participants who completed the Education Participation Scale. E.P.S. data were subject to factor analysis and orthogonal rotation. Five factors were produced for the parent population and a sub-sample of 76 participants. Factor scores were related through correlation and analysis of variance to variables such as age, previous participation, occupation, educational attain ment, subject enrolled, and place of birth. The E.P.S. factors were labelled as indicative of life-chance or life-space motivation. Sev eral hypothesized relationships were confirmed, but it was argued that further research concerning the social and psychological foun dations of motive for participation is needed.

Educational Participation and Dropout: a Theoretical Model

A "congruence" model based on self theory is proposed to account for adult education participation and dropout. Single variable explanations for these phenomena are rejected. It is contended that participation may be understood as a function of self/institution incongruence and dropout a function of intra-self and self/other incongruence. It is suggested that social, psychological and insti tutional variables typically studied in participation and dropout research merely mediate the congruence-dropout relationship. Data derived from 2436 participants enrolled in continuing non-credit classes in New Zealand are offered in support of parts of the model. The model is experimentally and administratively suggestive and replete with hypotheses capable of empirical investigation.

Birth Order and Conservatism: An Adlerian Myth?

To test Adler's suggestion that firstborn people are more conservative than later borns, a sample of Teachers' College students, and a second sample of adult education participants, completed a valid and reliable measure of conservatism. Adler's contention was not borne out.

Educational Variables and Participation in Adult Education: an Exploratory Study

The conceptual framework for analyzing continuous learning through the educative community developed by Essert and Spence was used in this study to examine six representative educational variables in relation to participation to determine whether or not the use of additional educational variables would increase the power of education to predict participation compared to consider ing only the years of school completed by the participant as is normally done. Data were obtained from interviews with 510 married male household heads resident in the rural portions of the Lower Fraser Valley in British Columbia. In bivariate analysis, each predictor variable was associated with total participation and with participation in vocational courses whereas participation in non-vocational courses was not related to educational variables. Partial correlation coefficients indicated that only the years of school completed by the wife and respondent remained as influ ences on total and vocational course participation when the effects of the six predictors were controlled simultaneously. Previous research has suggested that the educational level of the respondent is the most important single factor influencing participation, but the findings of the present study suggest that the years of school completed by the wife may also be an important factor.

Motivational Orientations of Adult Education Participants: a Factor Analytic Exploration of Houle's Typology

To test Houle's typology of "motivational orientation" in a New Zealand context, and to develop a factor analytically based mea sure of motive for attendance, 233 adult education participants selected at random from three institutions completed a 48 item Education Participation Scale. A factor analysis and promax/ varimax rotation yielded 14 first-order factors which were subse quently intercorrelated, factor analysed and rotated to yield second and then third-order factors. The meaning of the resultant factors is discussed. In developing a model of adult education participa tion, it is proposed that participants are basically "being" or "deficiency" motivated. The concept of homeo and heterostasis is discussed. Education Participation Scale factors purporting to measure these different types of motivation are identified. Partici pation is shown to stem from motives moie complex than those originally identified by Houle.

Adult Education Participation in the Industrial Suburb of West Milwaukee, Wisconsin

The village of West Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was studied to de termine availability of and participation in adult education pro grams by village residents. Although funds and facilities were available to support educational programs, the survey revealed a low participation rate of 9.4 per cent. It is felt that this and other findings reflect the traditionally negative attitude toward further education often found in lower middle-class societal groups and the inability of adult education agencies to provide educa tional programs to attract this segment of the population.