During the past 25 years, self-directed, informal, and independent learning by adults has been the subject of a significant amount of research in North America but comparatively little research in Great Britain. In the United States and Canada, "self-directed learning" has become an umbrella term that has been used by different researchers in a wide range of disciplines to describe a wide variety of phenomena. Allen Tough, who began studying self-directed learning in the 1960s, identified the tasks addressed and assistance obtained during self-teaching projects and the major reasons why adults begin and continue learning projects. Tough's work generated a massive amount of interest in the topic of adults' independent learning efforts, including the first national investigation of self-initiated learning by Penland in 1979, Brockett's 1983 study of self-directed learning among undereducated adults, and several major studies of the organizing circumstances of self-directed learning. Stephen Brookfield has been Great Britain's most prolific writer on self-directed learning. His 1980 doctoral dissertation paved the way for later qualitative and quantitative studies of self-directed learning in Great Britain. British efforts to study self-directed learning have just begun, however, and much more empirical evidence remains to be gathered. (Contains 67 references.) (MN)