Living, learning and narrating in the third stage of life.A qualitative panel study on constructions of identity and processes of learning and Bildung in biographical retellings

本研究以一种实证创新的方式探讨了一个当前与社会相关的主题：身份的建构和学习的过程，通过定性的小组研究和复述的方法论可能性来检验。教育政策倡导的终身学习概念导致了社会对学习的理解的时空侵蚀。一方面，机构之外的学习--由于其长期性--在日常生活中基本上不被注意到，更有可能成为关注的焦点。另一方面，很明显，对学习的欣赏和支持并不局限于学习者的年龄。随着65岁至67岁开始退休，预期寿命的不断延长和生活质量的提高，导致了从开始退休到高龄之间的第三个生命阶段。然而，生命的这一阶段受到特定主观挑战的支配：结束有报酬的工作，评估新的意义问题，并可能预测机会空间的消失，所有这些都存在着与个人身份认同的构建有关。定性研究是必要的，以便能够就这种发展和认同过程以及相关的长期学习和成长过程发表声明。这种研究方法欣赏个体现在的存在，来自他们的主观解释和相关性，但不停留在重建分析中。传记叙事访谈、叙事结构方法和复述的分析选项是可能的。实证材料的独特之处在于它进一步扩展到小组研究。在2006-2007年间，有可能对年龄从52岁到68岁的15个人进行传记叙事访谈，并在2017年对相同的人进行第二次调查。该项目的特别原创性和主要创新在于其纵向设计和所谓的“新旧人”目标群体，因为由于研究支出，关于学习和成长过程分析的小组研究非常罕见。复述的具体分析选项使得在两次访谈的纵向比较中识别叙述者自我形象和世界观的时间过程和变化成为可能。作为横断面分析的访谈逻辑的最小比较和最大比较可以归结为类型学。

The research addresses a currently societal relevant subject in an empirical innovative way: Constructions of identity and processes of learning and Bildung are examined by a qualitative panel study and methodical possibilities of retelling.The education-policy initiated concept of lifelong learning led to a spatial and temporal eroding of society’s understanding of learning. On the one hand, learning outside of institutions and – due to its long-term nature – largely unnoticed in daily life, is more likely in the focus of attention. On the other hand, it becomes apparent that the appreciation and support of learning is not limited by the learner’s age.The continuous increasing life expectancy and the improving quality of life with the start of retirement at the age of 65 to 67 gave rise to a "third stage of life" between start of retirement and very old age. It is discursively connected to the concept of active and productive ageing.Nevertheless, this stage of life is governed by particular subjective challenges: The end of gainful employment, evaluating new questions of meaning and possibly anticipating fading spaces of opportunities all existentially concern the individual constructions of identity. Qualitative research is necessary in order to be able to make statements about such processes of development and identity and related long-term processes of learning and Bildung. This approach to research appreciates the being as the individuals are now, comes from their subjective interpretations and relevancies but does not remain in reconstructive analysis. This is possible with biographical narrative interviews, the narrative structural method and the analysis options of retellings.The unique feature of the empirical material is its further expansion to a panel study. It was possible to conduct biographical narrative interviews with 15 individuals aged from 52 to 68 years in 2006-2007 and to conduct a second survey with the same individuals in 2017.The project’s particularly originality and major innovation is in its longitudinal design and its target group of the so-called "new old ones", because panel studies on the analysis of processes of learning and Bildung are very rare due to the research expenditure. The specific analysis options of retellings make it possible to identify temporal processes and changes of the narrators self image and view of the world in a longitudinal comparison of the two interviews. The minimum and maximum comparison of the developed interview logics as cross-sectional analysis can be condensed to typologies.