Transformative Learning: Positive Identity Through Prison-Based Higher Education in England and Wales

Theoretical Framework: The Theory Of Transformative Learning

This article adopts the theory of transformative learning, as a potential conceptual framework for understanding how adults learn. It then explores the potential of adult higher learning in prisons in the UK through a transformative learning lens. Transformative learning can be defined as ‘a process by which previously uncritically assimilated assumptions, beliefs, values, and perspectives are questioned and thereby become more open, permeable, and better justified (Cranton, 2006, p. vi).’

The theory of transformative learning was first developed in the United States in 1978 by Jack Mezirow after he investigated the factors which impeded and facilitated women’s progress into higher education through re-entry programmes (Mezirow, 2000b). The findings suggested that the women who participated in the programmes had undergone a perspective transformation in their personal development by becoming more critically aware of their beliefs and feelings about themselves and their role in society. Influenced by Habermas (1984), Mezirow (1991) differentiated between instrumental learning and dialogic (or communicative) learning. He considered instrumental learning to be task-oriented problem-solving for improved performance while dialogic learning involved critically assessing what was being communicated, enabling the learner to recognise unquestioned assumptions and beliefs which they have held since childhood. In turn, this could lead to self-reflective learning, if the learner is able to internalise the reasons for the new perspective.