This paper is the third of a series of three which attempt to integrate categories of description aimed at characterizing the experience of learning in terms of the logical relationships that exist between them. The description of the qualitatively different ways in which various aspects of reality are experienced and conceptualized, and the search for logical relations between the categories of description arrived at have been labelled phenomenography. Two different ways of experiencing a learning situation are described: deep approach and surface approach. In the former the learner is looking for relations between the parts of the text as well as between the text and that which its content can be linked to. He is experiencing himself as the active agent of learning; he is the one who does the learning. In the second way of experiencing learning, the surface approach, the learner is dealing with the parts in isolation and ascribes to himself a passive role in the learning process. The way of experiencing a learning situation is related to the learner's conception of learning. The conception of learning underlies both how learning is experienced (by the learner) and how it is described (by the researcher). (Author/PN)