What is Habits of Mind

This feminist arts-informed study investigates “depression” as transformation in the lives of young rural women in Nova Scotia, Canada. The author facilitated interviews and zine workshops with four young women who experienced severe depression in their early 20s and remain “angled toward it.” Drawing from Transformative Learning theory, the author asks: How does lived experience of severe psychic suffering affect the “habits of minds” (Mezirow, 1978) of young women? By doing so, the author responds to calls for adult education research on mental health and the intersections between women's emotions, bodies, transformative learning, and the arts. The author addresses the dearth of research on mental illness and transformation and offers preliminary implications for Transformative Learning theory.