Personal development

Another, broader concept for holistic learning is ‘personal development’ or ‘personality development’. Unlike experience it cannot be related to a single event or a brief course but concerns the effect of the total learning in a certain context over a certain period of time.

There are many definitions of ‘personality’, such as ‘the person as a whole having different skills, dispositions and qualities, emotions and motives’ (Hansen et al. 1997, p. 295), and it is typical here that it is about the whole viewed in relation to the qualities, or what we call characteristics, that cut across different divisions such as the learning dimensions. If, for example, one says that a person is ‘tolerant’, it will normally imply that this tolerance applies across many or all spheres, although perhaps with varying strength. It is thus something that is difficult to specify and measure, but which, on the other hand, plays a major role in life.

In terms of learning there is the particular aspect of personality and personal qualities that they are to some extent anchored in certain individual genetic predispositions – such as what was at one time understood by temperament. These predispositions develop and form through life’s influences, however, so some learning is also occurring, but, as mentioned, typically in the form of more general, long-lasting and, as a rule, demanding processes that imply considerable personal efforts and thus presuppose a significant degree of motivation. Put in everyday terms, you only change your personality or substantial parts of it if you perceive that there are good grounds for doing so.

In learning – and particularly institutionalised learning within the edu- cational system and working life – personal development, in general, and the development of specific types of personal qualities, have since the 1960s increasingly become an area of substantial interest and study.

There has been a distinct development in what workplaces require of their staff, where the demand for professional qualifications has gradually been supplemented, and partly overshadowed, by the demand for ‘generic’ qualifications that precisely have the character of personal qualities. Today this is extremely obvious from job advertisements in the press and is also confirmed by the dominant attitudes of personnel managers.

In connection with a research project on general qualifications I was involved in analysing these matters in greater detail (Andersen et al. 1994, 1996), and in the course of this work the current personal qualification requirements were summarised in the following categories:

• Intellectual qualifications, that typically cover definitions such as rational, systematic and analytical thinking, sociological imagina- tion, problem solving, change of perspective and skills in diag- nostics, evaluation, planning etc. – centring on the individual’s capacity for rational behaviour.

• Perception qualifications, concerning precise sense perception, typically including precision in observation and interpretation – centring on what is defined as sensibility in academic terms. • Self-control qualifications, covering definitions such as responsi-

bility, reliability, perseverance, accuracy, ability to concentrate, quality and service orientation – centring on the individual’s inclinations and capacity to act in accordance with general instruc- tions.

• Individuality qualifications, typically covering definitions such as independence, self-confidence and creativity – centring on the individual’s ability to act alone, especially in unforeseen situations. • Social qualifications, covering definitions such as co-operation and communication abilities, congeniality and sociability – centring on the individual’s ability to interact with others.

• Motivational qualifications, covering a range of definitions such as initiative, dynamism, drive, openness, keenness to learn, adapt- ability etc. – centring on the individual’s potential to keep up with and contribute to the ‘development’ (the much-used category ‘flexi- bility’ is often used as a group description for this sphere, but it also partially includes social qualifications).

(Illeris 1995, pp. 60–61) What is characteristic of all these categories is that they cover all three learning dimensions but are weighted differently. In the motivational

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qualifications the incentive dimension is very important, for example, and the same is true of the self-control and individuality qualifications, although to a lesser degree. The main emphasis is on the content dimension in the intellectual qualifications and perception qualifications. The social quali- fications clearly draw on the interaction dimension in particular.

With respect to the teaching and learning that can further the development of such personal qualifications, the project concluded that the academic and the general or personality elements in the practical organisation of education may be understood and treated as two aspects of the same thing: Briefly, education that is to strengthen general qualifications in a goal- directed way must be neither pure instruction, learning of skills or rote learning, nor pure personal development or therapy. It must on the contrary be organised in such a way that it combines a concrete, typical vocational or academic qualification with opportunities for expanding the participants’ motivation to develop understanding, personality and identity.

(Illeris et al. 1995, p. 188) Altogether, development in society’s qualification demands thus can be seen to prompt an educational effort for attempting the development of a very broad range of personal qualities by the organisation of teach- ing to combine a professional and a personality-oriented approach. In practice this typically occurs through problem-oriented and, to some extent, participant-directed projects with a concrete professional content that also involves, recalls and deals with relevant personal function spheres (Illeris et al. 1995; Andersen et al. 1996).

8.4 Competence

When it comes to what learning as a whole can result in, the classic concept in Germany and the Scandinavian countries has, as mentioned in section 5.1, been ‘formation’. But, partly because of the endless discussions of what this concept really implies, and partly because it frequently has elitist overtones, during the 1970s and 1980s it became more common to speak of ‘qualifications’ and ‘qualification’. The qualification concept is obviously more precise in relation to the concept of formation, but it is also more technocratic and, first and foremost, more vocationally oriented in its starting point and the way it is generally understood. Therefore, it was necessary to ‘invent’ and use the concept of ‘general qualification’ if a broader aim was to be included (see Andersen et al. 1994, 1996).

In recent years the concept of ‘competence’ has taken a central position – and this is not merely a chance or indifferent linguistic innovation. On the contrary, it could be said that this linguistic change takes the full

consequence of the schism in the qualification concept outlined above. What I consider to be the most fully adequate Danish definition phrases it as follows:

The concept of competence refers . . . to a person’s being qualified in a broader sense. It is not merely that a person masters a professional area, but also that the person can apply this professional knowledge – and more than that, apply it in relation to the requirements inherent in a situation which perhaps in addition is uncertain and unpredictable. Thus competence also includes the person’s assessments and attitudes, and ability to draw on a considerable part of his/her more personal qualifications.

(Jørgensen 1999, p. 4) Competence is thus a unifying concept that integrates everything it takes in order to perform a given situation or context. The concrete qualifications are incorporated in the competence rooted in personality, and one may generally also talk of the competence of organisations and nations.

Where the concept of qualifications historically has its point of departure in requirements for specific knowledge and skills, and to an increasing degree has been used for pointing out that this knowledge and these skills have underlying links and roots in personality, the perception in the concept of competence has, so to speak, been turned upside down. In this concept, the point of departure lies at the personal level in relation to certain contexts, and the more specific qualifications are something that can be drawn in and contribute to realisation of the competence. Where the concept of qualifi- cations took its point of departure in the individual elements, the individual qualifications, and has developed towards a more unified perception, the concept of competence starts with a unity, e.g. the type of person or organ- isation it takes to solve a task or fulfil a job, and on the basis of this points out any possible different qualifications necessary.

It is thus characteristic that the concept of competence does not, like the concept of qualifications, have its roots in industrial sociology, but in organisational psychology and modern management thinking. It has thus acquired a dimension of ‘smartness’ which makes it easier to ‘sell’ politi- cally, but also makes it tend toward a superficiality which, in this context, seems to characterise large parts of the management orientation (see Argyris 2000); it has thus been called a ‘prostitute’ concept rooted in an economic view of man by the Danish philosopher, Jens Erik Kristensen (Kristensen 2001).

However, at the same time it is difficult to deny that it captures something central in the current situation of learning and qualification. It is ultimately concerned with how a person, an organisation or a nation is able to handle a relevant, but often unforeseen and unpredictable problematic situation,

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because we know with certainty that late-modern development constantly generates new and unknown problems, and the ability to respond openly and in an appropriate way to new problematic situations is crucial in determining who will manage in the globalised market society.

However, great problems have also developed concerning the definition and application of the competence concept. This is primarily because a number of national and supranational bodies have taken over the concept and sought to implement it as a management tool. Wide-ranging work has been initiated to define a number of competences that the various education programmes should aim at and to make these measurable in order to make it possible to judge whether the efforts succeed (see Illeris 2004). I will not go further in my criticism of these matters here. At present it seems that the problems involved in such ‘technocratisation of competence’ have been so great that the project has been shelved, in Denmark at least.

But I do find it important to point out that the concept of competence also contains some extremely positive openings for making a contribution to a general or holistically oriented understanding of the far-reaching perspectives and requirements embedded in the current discussion about learning. This was already pointed out in connection with the model development in section 3.2, where the competence concept in relation to the learning dimensions in general was presented as a combination of functionality, sensitivity and sociality.

I find it important – together with the definition of competence quoted above (Jørgensen 1999) – to maintain such a broad, holistic understanding of competence both on the general level and in relation to certain areas of action. A parallelism with the understanding of learning is thus indicated, which I regard as being an important theoretical point because it makes possible overall thinking and treatment of learning as process, and compe- tence as something aimed at in this process. This is particularly important vis-à-vis a concept of competence which is rapidly becoming the horse dragging a carriage of narrow economically oriented control interests that deprive the concept of the liberating potential springing from the place of the competences as relevant contemporary mediators between the societal challenges and individual ways of managing them.

The concept of competence can thus be used as a point of departure for a more nuanced understanding of what learning efforts today are about – with a view to reaching a theoretically based and practically tested proposal concerning how up-to-date competence development can be realised for different people in accordance with their possibilities and needs, both within and outside of institutionalised education programmes. Such an approach has, in my opinion, far better and more well founded possibilities for contributing to real competence development, at the individual level as well as the societal level, than the measuring and comparing approach that has been mentioned above. However, it will to a much higher degree be

oriented towards experiments and initiatives at practice level than the top- down control approach inherent in the measuring models.

Quite concretely it is about the fact that competence development may be promoted in environments where learning takes place in connection with a (retrospective) actualisation of relevant experience and contexts, that (at the same time) interplay between relevant activities and interpretation of these activities in a theoretical conceptual framework, and a (prospective) reflection and perspective, i.e. a pervasive perspective in relation to the participants’ life or biography, linked with a meaning and conception- oriented reflection and a steady alternation between the individual and the social levels within the framework of a community (see Illeris 2004). 8.5 Learning and identity

If one wants to examine the overall results of learning, it is, however, not enough to look at competence development. For learning to be maintained in the whole of the breadth encompassed by this book, there must also be focus on the connection, and thereby the understanding and application value, that what is learned has for the learner. There are a number of different concepts with a somewhat different perspective that could be relevant to take up here.

I have already looked at the concept of ‘the self ’ several times, in section 4.6 and especially in section 5.6, where it concerned the self as the content object of learning. I also mentioned here that this concept has been disputed – but under all circumstances it has the character of a mental instance concerned with the individual’s experience of themselves, i.e. one ‘looks at’ or experiences oneself from the inside.

Another concept in the area is ‘personality’, which, among other things, has given the name to the psychological discipline of ‘personality psychology’. It is characteristic here, however, that the individual is ‘looked at’ or characterised from the outside; for example, different qualities are attributed to the individual which eventually can be registered by means of different (personality) tests.

There is, in addition, the more recent concept of ‘habitus’, developed by French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002). This concept implies that the cultural and societal conditions with which the individual has been confronted are deposited as stable inner dispositions which, to a high degree, influence the individual’s mode of thought, emotion and action and thus become the focal point of the imprint of the social background (see Bourdieu and Passéron 1977 [1970]; Bourdieu 1998 [1994]).

All three concepts could even be useful in connection with the personality development which learning as a whole can result in, and in recent years not least the habitus concept has appeared in a great deal of pedagogically oriented literature (e.g. Hodkinson et al. 2004). Nevertheless, I prefer here

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to take my point of departure in the somewhat older concept of ‘identity’, because I regard it as being the most holistic concept that expressly ranges over both the individual and the social level.

The identity conception that today is regarded as classical was primarily drawn up by the German-American psychoanalyst Erik H. Erikson, especially in his book entitled Identity, Youth and Crisis (Erikson 1968). Erikson belonged to the post-war ‘neo-Freudians’, who distanced themselves from what they regarded as deterministic characteristics in Freud, were more oriented towards societal conditions, and also attributed increased significance to the ego in relation to the drives, i.e. that, to a higher degree than in Freud’s understanding, the individual has the possibility of controlling his or her own life.

The word identity, itself, refers to the Latin idem, which means ‘the same’ and has to do with the experience of being the same or recognisable both to oneself and others in changing situations. This also points to the duality in the identity, so central to Erikson’s concept, namely, that one is an individual creation, a biological life while simultaneously being a social and societal being, in the last analysis without any individual possibility for existence. Therefore, identity is always an individual biographical identity, an experience of a coherent individuality and a coherent life course, at the same time as being a social, societal identity, an experience of a certain position in the social community.

In this way there is a striking parallelism between Erikson’s concept of identity and the concept of learning outlined in this book. In both cases, there are two linked characteristics which always coexist and work together. Corresponding to Erikson’s individual side of identity, and the personal experience of coherence in Erikson, is the individual acquisition process in learning that takes place within the framework of structures which, in the final analysis, are made possible by means of the enormously complicated biological development of the human brain and central nervous system. And corresponding to Erikson’s social side of identity and the experience of how one is experienced by others is the social interaction process of learning, which takes place within the framework of the societally developed structures of the surroundings. Thus, from the point of view of learning, identity development can be understood as the individually specific essence of total learning, i.e. as the coherent development of meaning, functionality, sensitivity and sociality, and in the learning figure its core area can be placed around the meeting between the two double arrows that illustrate the two simultaneous processes of learning (Figure 8.1).

At the same time, Erikson’s concept of the youth stage and the develop- ment of identity is part of an overall concept of the course of a human life as a series of life stages, where each stage culminates in a crisis, the solution to which is a prerequisite for a successful life in the next stage. Erikson outlines a total of eight stages, the fifth of which is adolescence,

which is centred around identity development that can end in a more or less stable and coherent identity formation or become side-tracked and end in identity confusion, producing great problems in adult life.

Erikson characterises his stages theory as ‘epigenic’, which means that the stages have been developed throughout the phylogenetic history of human beings. They are thus part of our genetic heredity in the way that the central problem in each individual stage is already nascent in the earlier stages and is carried into the later stages as a potential for further development. Thus identity formation is not merely something taking place in the youth stage. It reaches far back into early childhood and can continue throughout the whole of life, but its crucial moments lie in the identity crisis of youth.

It should also be mentioned that Erikson’s identity theory has been strongly criticised for being merely a refined adjustment theory because successful identity formation appears as the individual’s adjustment to the norms of the group and the society, while more than momentary resistance to the norms is stamped as being identity confusion.

If we return to the youth phase in our present postmodern society, it is clear that a type of identity process still exists, that young people, in one way or the other, are trying to discover who they are and want to be, personally and socially. But both the notions of a more or less fixed