[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-589361-105":59,"doc-detail-589361-en":131},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",[7,13,18,23,28,33,38,43,48,51,55],{"id":8,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":10,"show_sort_weight":11,"slug":12},1,"Document","Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":14,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":15,"show_sort_weight":16,"slug":17},2,"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":19,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":20,"show_sort_weight":21,"slug":22},4,"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":24,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":25,"show_sort_weight":26,"slug":27},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":29,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":30,"show_sort_weight":31,"slug":32},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":34,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":35,"show_sort_weight":36,"slug":37},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":39,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":40,"show_sort_weight":41,"slug":42},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":44,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":45,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":47},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":46,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":49,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":50},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":53,"show_sort_weight":52,"slug":54},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":56,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":57,"show_sort_weight":24,"slug":58},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":60,"data":61},"ok",{"site_id":62,"language":63,"slug":64,"title":65,"keywords":66,"description":67,"schema_data":68,"social_meta":124,"head_meta":126,"extra_data":128,"updated_unix":130},105,"en","a-secure-base-for-adult-learning-attachment-theory-and-adult-education","A Secure Base for Adult Learning - Attachment Theory and Adult Education","","Adult learning is commonly discussed through debates on lifelong learning and critical theory, yet attachment concepts are largely missing from adult education discourse. This paper applies John Bowlby’s attachment theory to adult education, examining secure and insecure attachments, internal working models, the strange situation, and mind-mindedness. It interprets these models as strategies for coping with stress, anxiety, change, and teaching-learning challenges, and connects changing internal working models to transformative learning.",{"@graph":69,"@context":123},[70,84,106],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/a-secure-base-for-adult-learning-attachment-theory-and-adult-education/589361/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/a-secure-base-for-adult-learning-attachment-theory-and-adult-education/589361.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Đào","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-03","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":105},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",12,{"@type":107,"mainEntity":108},"FAQPage",[109,115,119],{"name":110,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":112},"What attachment theory concepts does the paper use to connect to adult education?","Question",{"text":113,"@type":114},"The paper explores secure and insecure attachments, internal working models, the strange situation, and the contemporary concept of mind-mindedness.","Answer",{"name":116,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":117},"How does the paper interpret internal working models in adult learning and teaching?",{"text":118,"@type":114},"It treats internal working models as strategies adults use to deal with stress, anxiety, change, and the challenges of teaching and learning.",{"name":120,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":121},"What relationship does the paper identify between attachment theory and transformative learning?",{"text":122,"@type":114},"It proposes that changing internal working models can function as a form of transformative learning.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":125,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":127,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":129,"site_id":62},589361,1792168039,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":132},{"doc_id":129,"user_id":133,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":134,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":135,"file_id":136,"file_url":137,"file_type":138,"file_size":139,"view_count":105,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":140,"language":141,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":142,"faqs":143,"seo_title":144,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":145,"read_time":146,"preview_page_count":4},1374402968488,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_29158cc5080c5b710cf443261637dec0","A Secure Base for Adult Learning:  \nAttachment Theory and Adult Education  \nted fleming  \nAbstract  \nThe attachment theory of John Bowlby has had an enduring impact on our understanding of child development. But these ideas are a neglected and forgotten discourse in adult education. In this paper concepts such as secure and insecure attachments, internal working models, and the strange situation along with the more contemporary concept of mind-mindedness are explored. The paper also explores the implications for how adults deal with new situations and new ideas; how adult learners and teachers are influenced by their own attachment styles and internal working models. These models are interpreted as strategies that adults employ for dealing with stress, anxiety, change and the challenges of teaching and learning. In addition, the implications of these concepts for understanding transformative learning are identified and changing internal working models is proposed as a form of transformative learning. This paper outlines Bowlby’s main ideas, with a focus on recent research findings and, by extrapolation, reframes our current understanding of adult learning. The ideas presented here are not usually part of adult education debates but may provide useful insights for facilitators of adult learning and personal development.  \nKeywords: Attachment theory; Secure attachments; Internal working models; Secure base; Mind-mindedness; Transformation theory; Adult learning.  \nIntroduction  \nAdult education has grown accustomed to a particular palette of debates including lifelong learning and more critical understandings of learning. These critical understandings involve a reinterpretation of the meaning of lifelong learning that, if they are to be of value, need to be combined, with “a critical  \ntheory of society”(Murphy, 2001, p. 181). Neo-liberals and functionalists have colonised the lifelong learning debate with a fixation on technique, the economy and vocationalism (Welton, 1995). Even when the debate is more critical, as in Brookfield’s (2005) work on critical theory and Tennant’s (2006) psychology textbook, there is a missing dimension.  \nThis paper claims that part of the missing dimension is filled by a critical investigation of John Bowlby’s attachment theory. It maybe because these ideas have a biological base or a psychoanalytical dimension that they have been ignored. In addition, more critical perspectives focus on how culture and society are reproduced through interpersonal relations and, in particular, through parenting and childrearing practices. Bowlby offers a theory that attempts to integrate biology, a psychoanalytic analysis of early childhood experiences and some aspects of socio-cultural reproduction. This paper aims to address some aspects of the missing body of knowledge and illustrate how attachment theory is of profound and neglected importance for understanding adult learning and teaching.  \nThese ideas allow adult educators find a new set of ideas and vocabulary with which to describe practices in the classroom and in the process understand more thoroughly the issues that make teaching and learning exciting, challenging and always more complex than we might imagine. This paper outlines Bowlby’s main ideas, with a focus on recent research findings and, by extrapolating from these ideas, reframes our current understandings of adult learning.  \nJohn Bowlby and Attachment Theory  \nJohn Bowlby’s (1907-1991) work as a child psychiatrist with children from poor backgrounds convinced him that family life was important for their emotional development and that the separation of a young child from mother was detrimental to the child’s development (Bowlby, 1951). Bowlby (1944), in trying to understand the causes of delinquency (a term widely used in 1944), the nature of the child's ties to mother (1958), the meaning of separation anxiety (1960a) and the significance of grief and mourning for young children (1960b), outl","cbCaikVOBV3tDf3H","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaikVOBV3tDf3H","pdf",250613,21,"English","# Abstract\n# Introduction\n# John Bowlby and Attachment Theory","[{\"question\":\"What attachment theory concepts does the paper use to connect to adult education?\",\"answer\":\"The paper explores secure and insecure attachments, internal working models, the strange situation, and the contemporary concept of mind-mindedness.\"},{\"question\":\"How does the paper interpret internal working models in adult learning and teaching?\",\"answer\":\"It treats internal working models as strategies adults use to deal with stress, anxiety, change, and the challenges of teaching and learning.\"},{\"question\":\"What relationship does the paper identify between attachment theory and transformative learning?\",\"answer\":\"It proposes that changing internal working models can function as a form of transformative learning.\"}]","A Secure Base for Adult Learning - Attachment Theory and Adult Education | PDF",1792067042,53]