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Education is the main vehicle for empowering adults, and can contribute to community wellbeing. However, regarding mature adults (MAs) (over 45 years old), age has been identified in various studies as a significant barrier to accessing educational activities. This paper focuses on MAs' motivations to learn through an exploratory survey undertaken in six European countries. A K-means cluster analysis based on 16 variables has been run on n = 846 valid cases. Four clusters describing distinctive behaviours and attitudes of MAs towards learning activities were identified. The study confirms that MAs' motivations to learn are very diverse, overcoming some of the so-called "myths of global aging," such as the homogeneity of MAs or the correlation between age and a decline in motivation to learn. Furthermore, analysing the main motivations of MA learners can be useful for adapting education to cater to their specific needs, boosting a more inclusive education, and promoting MAs' empowerment.

This paper presents preliminary findings of an extensive socio-legal research project, currently in progress, concerning the implementation of the European Union and the Greek institutional framework on lifelong learning (LLL) and exploring the social effectiveness of LLL policy. The main outcomes, based on testing two research hypotheses through quantitative and qualitative content analysis, are presented. Firstly, there are significant differences in the ranking of four LLL objectives (employability/adaptability takes priority over social inclusion, personal fulfilment and active citizenship) as between legal documents of different origin (EU or national) and binding force (hard or soft law). Secondly, the key role of the global recession of 2008 in reinforcing the economic dimension of EU policy in the field is revealed. These data, considered from a socio-legal perspective, provide a basis for further discussion regarding national alignment to the EU's LLL policy and argue for new 'policy syntheses' informed by the views of social actors concerned with policy implementation, in line with a broad humanistic notion of LLL.