How People Learn II Learners, Contexts, and Cultures (2018) / Chapter Skim
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9 Learning Across the Life Span
9 Learning Across the Life Span
Pages 197-224
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From page 197... ...
Their report emphasized the importance of the learning context for knowledge transfer but did not elaborate on that point with respect to changes in learning and cognition across the life span. The learning processes discussed in this report function throughout the life span, but many do change with age, as do the contexts in which people learn and the reasons for engaging in continuous development through their life span.
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An individual's knowledge base and motivation for learning also change. These changes reflect variations in the environments in which people learn as they get older and the types of learning activities they are likely to undertake.
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. Motivation for Learning In Chapter 6, we discussed influences on people's motivation to learn that apply in general across the life span, but what people value and other aspects of motivation are likely to change as they age.
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Specifically, research points to the value of training for older learners that enhances the learner's self-efficacy, accommodates age-related differences in cognitive capacities and emotional reactions to feedback, uses content that builds on the trainee's existing knowledge and skills, and has immediate relevance to the trainee. Learning Activities and Environments The environments in which people learn also vary as they progress through the life span.
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. Figure 9-1 provides a framework for thinking about the types of learning and development activities in which a person might engage over the life span.
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In Chapter 3, we discussed the ways adult brains may compensate for declines in some kinds of cognition by recruiting other resources. Although late adulthood has been associated with decreases in the cognitive abilities associated with learning novel information, memory, and speed, this stage has also been associated with increased skill in solving social dilemmas (Grossman et al., 2010)
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Researchers have explored this idea by examining the effects of more localized environments or subcultures on cognitive aging and asking how the community environment affects the way that cognition changes as a person ages, but these investigations have not yet established a clear answer. That is, effects have been noted in a number of studies, but the magnitude of the effects, as well as the specific domains showing the largest effects, have varied from study to study (e.g., Cassarino et al., 2015; Wu et al., 2015)
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Dyslexia, which is difficulty reading that results from problems in identifying speech sounds and learning how they relate to letters and words, is the most prevalent and easily recog nized type of learning disability. Individuals who have disabilities in reading may also have other disorders of attention, language, and behavior, but each affects learning in a different way (Cortiella and Horowitz, 2014)
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Moreover, given that learning is affected by a complex set of environmental and individual variables, the stigma of learning disabilities is likely to also affect continuing growth and development throughout the life span (Lindstrom, 2016)
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. Mathematics Disabilities Although mathematics disabilities have been less thoroughly researched than reading disabilities, they are also common.5 The fact that some children have disabilities in both areas suggests that a similar cognitive deficit can play a role in both (Geary, 1993, 2013)
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Children with math disabilities have pervasive deficits across all working memory systems, but understanding of the relationship between specific components of working memory and specific mathematical cognition is still in the developmental stages (Geary, 2013; Swanson, 2016)
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, it is unclear whether adults with reading disabilities have cognitive deficits similar to those that have been noted in children or whether adults' cognitive deficits are the result of other factors, such as relatively lower general intelligence compared to adults not suffering from reading disabilities. In one examination of these issues, Swanson and colleagues (Flynn et al., 2012; Swanson, 2012; Swanson and Hsieh, 2009)
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. Adaptive, intelligent tutorial programs can address a range of skills and needs, and programs available online allow students to access the learning environments in their own homes, neighborhood libraries, schools, houses of worship, or locations of employment.
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and small group interactive settings yielded the greatest improvement in treatment outcomes (Swanson, 2000)
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. POSTSECONDARY EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCES Once people complete their compulsory education, they may pursue further education in a variety of settings (e.g., community college, college, university, vocational or technical schools)
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This research suggests that cognitive ability (typically measured through standardized tests) and high school performance tend to account for the most variance in college grade point average, but motivational factors such as academic self-efficacy, intrinsic motivation, and goal orientation also have been positively associated with academic performance (Ackerman et al., 2013; Richardson et al., 2012)
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Although very little research has examined tailored instruction with working-age adults, the available evidence suggests that older learners may benefit from more structure (i.e., step-by-step instruction) in highly complex training environments (Carter and Beier, 2010; Gully et al., 2002)
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. Determining Whether People Learn in the Workplace The effectiveness of workplace training is typically assessed in four ways that derive from an evaluation framework designed to assess an array of outcomes, from trainee reactions to the organization's return on investment (Alliger and Janak, 1989; Kirkpatrick, 1967)
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. However, features of the organizational environment, such as how supportive managers and coworkers are when an employee uses a newly learned skill, influence transfer of workplace training back to the job (Blume et al., 2010; Rouiller and Goldstein, 1993)
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. The prevalence of autonomous workplace learning reflects the ways many kinds of careers have changed in industrialized countries over the past 50 years or so.
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will make participation in developmental activity even less likely. Research on self-regulation of learning provides another lens for thinking about individuals' workplace learning.
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This makes it extremely difficult to conduct any systematic evaluation of autonomous workplace learning and development activity. Nonetheless, the benefits of autonomous learning could be examined on the organizational level by tracking the amount, type, and quality of autonomous learning that occurs within an organization over a period of time and correlating these factors to outcomes such as employee capabilities, retention, and employee perceptions about the culture for learning and development (Tannenbaum et al., 2010)
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A survey of more than 400 workers across an array of professions identified learning from coworkers and peers, on-the-job training, trial and error, and observing others as the most common methods of workplace learning; classroom learning at college or formal organizational training were far less commonly cited as important for development at work (Tannenbaum, 1997)
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rather than process goals. The Importance of Active Engagement People learn continually through active engagement in their environments, and research has demonstrated that engaging in some activities promotes healthy aging, including performance in cognitive tasks (Bielak et al., 2012)
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. FOSTERING LIFELONG LEARNING Researchers have explored ways to foster learning across the life span.
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Studies have shown that skilled collaboration and social communication facilitate productivity in the general workplace (Klein et al., 2006; Salas et al., 2008) and, more specifically, in engineering and software development work (Sonnentag and Lange, 2002)
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CONCLUSION 9-1: People continue to learn and grow through out the life span, and their choices, motivation, and capacity for self-regulation, as well as their circumstances, influence how much and how well they learn and transfer their learn ing to new situations. CONCLUSION 9-2: People learn continually through active en gagement across many settings in their environments; learning that occurs outside of compulsory educational environments is a function of the learner's motivation, interests, and oppor tunities.
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