This chapter reviews the literature that takes a social psychological view on the self-concept and its three different facets, which are; the individual self; the relational self and the collective self and how these change though age. In addition, it also investigates how the self-concept is obtained through social comparison. It also focuses on social cognition and its role in stereotypes, and more specifically stereotypes towards mature students. Lastly it tackles briefly some studies regarding adult education and the current state of adult education in Malta.
Defining the Self-Concept
The self-concept has received a great deal of research from psychologists over the years. These studies portray the self-concept as how the person perceives oneself, and is obtained over the years through personal and social experiences and social comparisons. (Bong & Skaalvik, 2003; Festinger, 1954; Shavelson, Huber & Stanton,1976) Having a positive self-concept is a crucial part of wellbeing as it is associated with better psychological health and a higher level of school achievement while a negative self-concept is associated with school failure and anxiety (Keltikangas-Järvinen, 1990) Several theorists agree that the that self-concept is multi-dimensional. (Marsh, 1990) Many among them (Brewer & Gardner, 1996; Sedikides & Brewer, 2001; Sedikides, Gaertner & O’Mara, 2011) suggest that self has 3 parts individual self, the relational self, and the collective self. These parts can be