<p> As a relatively new field of psychology, positive psychology generates momentum to enlighten a reciprocating view of human nature, to look at human potential as opposed to human shortfalls. In the course of building the field and theoretical foundations, courses and programs in adult learning environments have been established to educate students. Quantitative measures of formative and summative evaluation evaluate one type of learning. Given the idea stemming from Aristotle philosophies that noted education as part of meaning in life (as cited in Curren, 2010), the established theoretical view that meaning itself is created by an individual and sets a path for a more flourishing life. Thus, by creating meaning from integrating established knowledge and new knowledge, the transformation processes takes place. For the reason that these types of transformations cannot be quantifiably measured, a collective case study was used to support the theoretical foundations for the presented research. The presented research paper reflects the critical element of data collection and interpretation. The research study details the qualitative dissertation exploration of the research question: How do educators teaching Positive Psychology in the adult learning environment describe students’ personal transformations in response to the curriculum? The specific research investigation was to explore the perceptions of the presiding educators and to realize their portrayals of the learning transformations in the positive Psychology adult learning environment. After addressing inclusive criteria for a bounded unit, data were collected from seven presiding educators of the adult learning positive psychology environment. Additionally, the participant wrote reflective narratives to deepen and widen the perspective of the study. The interviews consisted of conversational open-ended questions, and the narrative was a free-writing exercise to purposely unburden participants from parameters. From the data collected, a code list was generated and then categorized into themes through a constant comparison of similar of codes from within and between individual participant cases. The themes represented generated patterns across data that created a description the phenomenon associated with the research question. As a result of the findings, implications of usefulness and recommendations for further studies were discussed.</p>
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PROQUEST/oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:3700863 |
| Date | 14 May 2015 |
| Creators | Soots, Lynn M. |
| Publisher | Capella University |
| Source Sets | ProQuest.com |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | thesis |
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