Theoretical triangulation of academic self-formation: nine critical literature reviews and emerging questions

Working paper

This paper presents conceptual research that gathers, evaluates, and synthesises existing theories or concepts pertaining to students’ academic self-formation in higher education, as part of a doctoral project on that topic (Lee, 2021; 2023; 2024). The author conducted a series of critical literature reviews (Snyder, 2019) on different but related topics, resulting in nine conceptual essays bearing on aspects of academic self-formation. Each essay has four elements: (1) rationale for the focus on the concepts/theories; (2) what they tell us about the conditions, resources, and results of student self-formation; (3) how the self-formation approach reciprocally expands upon the selected concepts/theories; and (4) emerging questions or unresolved matters necessitating further exploration for a more thorough comprehension of academic selfformation. The essays presented in this paper contribute multiple and hybrid perspectives for theoretical reflection (Sayer, 1992) or theoretical triangulation (Denzin, 2012) of the phenomenon of academic self-formation. The paper extends the discussion in a previous CGHE working paper on the same topic (Lee, 2021).

Authors: Lee, S

• Publication status: Published
• Publisher: Centre for Global Higher Education, University of Oxford
• Series: Centre for Global Higher Education working paper series
• Publication date: 2024-05-01
• DOI: 10.5287/ora-bpnovvq6k
• EISSN: 2398-564X
• Paper number: 116
• Language: English
• Keywords: academic knowledge; critical literature review; student agency; self-formation