THE VALUE OF INFORMAL LEARNING FOR ILLITERATE OLDER WOMEN ACROSS THE LIFESPAN: Perceptions of Elderly Women from a Rural Region of Portugal

The role of informal learning in the construction of individual knowledge of both men and women throughout life is crucial to understand behaviors, attitudes, beliefs and self-images as members of society. This role is particularly compromised for illiterate people who did not have the opportunity to enjoy schooling during youth. Using the typology of informal learning proposed by Hrimech (2005), such persons may acquire knowledge either consciously or unintentionally by processes aggregated in tacit informal learning, explicit informal learning or self-directed learning. There are several central aspects to success in learning: intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to learn, observation of role