Edinburgh Napier University

  This conceptual paper seeks to explore the concepts of reflection and reflective practice to develop a critical understanding of the process and its multiple dimensions and the implications for HRD theory and practice. Although reflective practice has emerged over the last thirty years to become a key approach to practice-based learning, the theoretical discourse has evolved from different disciplinary backgrounds for a range of different purposes and is currently underdeveloped and fragmented. Drawing on a critical perspective of HRD and a critical realist philosophical stance, reflection and reflective practice will be analysed from a process perspective and a broad dialogical framework will be developed to stimulate further debate and analysis of the multiple dimensions of the concept.