Transfer, Learning, and Innovation: Perspectives Informed by Occupational Practices

The process of thinking and acting often referred to as transfer in the educational literature is positioned as being a key problem to be addressed educationally. However, the aim here is to position this process (and problem) as being shaped by and central to both individuals’ learning and development and societal progress. What is commonly called transfer is not qualitatively distinct from what is referred to as learning, adaptation, problem solving, and being innovative. However, all these processes of thinking and acting cannot be understood without accounting for the person acting and the actual or imagined circumstances in which they act and the relations between them. So, more than transfer being understood through the activities and interactions afforded by physical and social settings (e.g., schools), it is a process ultimately premised on and mediated by individuals’ thinking and acting. That is, they adapt what they know, can do, and value to workplace tasks. However, the process of adaptation is personally mediated in ways not fully accommodated by explanations privileging either mechanistic cognitive processes or universalist social suggestions. Instead, individuals’ thinking and acting is shaped sociopersonally, which includes brute facts (e.g., maturation) and social suggestions, albeit mediated by what individuals know, can do, and value. Occupations are social practices manifested situationally and culturally, and they continually evolve to meet changing social and cultural needs. Adults’ occupations are often central to who they are and how they exercise their sense of self. Hence, they provide a context to understand how these processes of thinking and acting play out in terms of personal and societal continuity, with individual mediation being a central quality. Therefore, rather than being an educational problem, what is referred to as transfer needs to be understood and responded to as an issue for learning and development.