Theories on Learning state that thematic interest is of high importance for the quality and persistence of learning. The American pragmatist John Dewey dedicated a small early essay to the question, whether interest or effort leads to better results in school learning. He states that interest is driven by experiences that cannot be handled via someone’s set of habits. This causes reflection and inquiry learning (Dewey 1913). German materialist learning theory states that learning is not started because of teaching, but because of subjective interest in expanding someone’s area of disposal. This is called expansive learning (Holzkamp 1993). Our own former qualitative research that builds upon these theories concludes that especially e-learning settings require thematic and methodical interest of the learner. Those learners, who were interested in the themes of the e-learning course as well as those who expressed their interest in e-learning itself, had the strongest subjective reasons to persist the complete course whilst others dropped off (Grotlüschen 2003).

This led to the question, how interest develops and grows among adult learners. The theoretical framework was extended from Klaus Holzkamp and John Dewey to the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu and his idea of ‘interest in a social game’ which means to accept the rules of the game and to value the gains available in this field as interesting. Bourdieu adds that interest has a facet of believing in a social game as being relevant. This belief is subjective, maybe even irrational and therefore Bourdieu uses the term “Illusio” to underline this characteristic of being interested in something ((Bourdieu und Wacquant 1996 (dt); 1992 (frz)). Bourdieu describes society in terms of fields and habitus. We use both field and habitus to explain our findings.

The research question – how does interest start and develop? – turns the research question from ‘interest as a status’ towards ‘interest as a process’ within society and time. Research on interest in learning, adult motivation and participation is known at least since the early 1920s, but mostly conceptualizes interest as a state. Recent research uses field theory to describe this state (Barz und Tippelt 2004, Bremer 1999). While we know which milieu is interested in which theme of adult education, we do not know how it happened. Where and why does interest begin? Where do people find the problems that lead to interest? How do people accept a social game as interesting?

If interest is not developed from the mere inside of a person, it begins with a first touch. But is a single touch enough to start a new area of interest? Do mass media play a role? Or is there a creative change from the ‘first touch’ towards the ‘area of interest’? How do interests towards a profession or working areas develop?

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