AAACE 2021 Annual Conference

Emotional abuse, female, adult learners

This systematic review of the literature spans 50 years looking at emotional abuse from a multidisciplinary and historical perspective. Core to understanding emotional abuse is recognizing how emotional abuse is situated over time and within the broad expanse of abuse literature, as well as the intersectionality with female adult learners.

This session for the CIAE pre-conference to the AAACE conference spans across continents and incorporates a look through a systematic review of the literature on emotional abuse over 50 years that intersects with current statistics in higher education of trends over the last 5 decades in which the number of adult learners on college campuses across the United States has increased. The importance of this work in the field of adult education is foundational in laying the groundwork for the presenter's doctoral dissertation. From an aspirational perspective, empowerment and voice for any marginalized population can be transformative both educationally and personally. It is the hypothesis of the presenter as a researcher that globally women as adult learners can transform the negative consequences of emotionally abusive experiences in ways that are transcendent. By intersecting what we know from the literature from both the nontraditional student learner perspective and how emotional abuse is situated in the abuse literature over a span of 50 years, the timeliness for future implications in moving the needle forward in the field of adult education and adult learning has the potential for an emancipatory impact for all.