Self-authorship is a stage of adult development in which a person has moved beyond needing to be socialized into the beliefs and expectations of their community and has instead developed their own identity, ideology and beliefs, which they hold to independently. The concept draws heavily on the work of Robert Kegan and Marcia Baxter Magolda, who have contributed extensively to how it is understood and recognized. Self-authorship has three primary dimensions, cognitive, intrapersonal and interpersonal, and it involves the capacity to turn one's own experiences into opportunities for growth rather than simply absorbing the views of others. In education, self-authorship is used mainly in the study of college and university students, describing the developmental shift from relying on external authority to define what to believe, how to act and who to be, toward constructing those answers for oneself.
Facts
Core ClaimSelf-authorship is a stage of adult development in which a person moves beyond depending on external social expectations and instead generates and coordinates their own identity, values, and beliefs from an internal authority. 1 FAQs
How can colleges help students develop self-authorship?
Through learning partnerships that engage students in interdependent relationships with educators.
Baxter Magolda describes self-authorship as the internal capacity to construct one's beliefs, identity and social relations, and she calls developing it crucial to successfully navigating adult life. She argues that learning partnerships, which engage college students in interdependent relationships with educators, support the transition from dependence on authority to self-authorship during college.
Connections
In Approach
Source Self-Authorship (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Self-Authorship (Wikipedia)
WikipediaSelf-authorship, lead paragraph
Self-authorship is a stage of adult development where the individual has extended beyond the need to be socialized among their community and has developed their own identity, ideologies, and beliefs which they hold fast to.
In Approach: Constructivism, Body
The first assumption states people create knowledge by interpreting their personal experiences through what is known as constructivism.
In Group: Adult Development Frameworks, Lead
Self-authorship is a stage of adult development where the individual has extended beyond the need to be socialized among their community and has developed their own identity, ideologies, and beliefs which they hold fast to.
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