The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to explore how military spouse learners in the online learning environment describe their experiences with cognitive dissonance and the ways they realign their cognition, attitudes, or behaviors of preconceived expectations with their actual experiences in the Southeastern United States. The theory of cognitive dissonance defined by Festinger, 1957 and the framework of andragogy defined by Knowles, 1955 expanded understanding of the phenomena of cognitive dissonance from the perspective of adult learners. The research involved 20 military spouse learners in online education to answer two overreaching research questions: (1) How do military spouse learners describe their experiences with cognitive dissonance based on their preconceived expectations of the online learning environment; and (2) How do military spouse learners describe the ways they realign their cognition, attitudes, or behaviors as adult learners in the online learning environment. This study employed thematic analysis to describe cognitive dissonance experiences as the difficulty of work that required more time, experiencing mental pressure and anxiety with the amount of work they faced, and difficulty communicating with family and juggling family responsibilities with the amount of work required. Military spouse learners used strategies focused on minimizing constant thoughts about online requirements, putting a plan into action designed with a goal in mind, establish a process that would exercise conscious control of time to increase productivity and prevent burnout, and sharing the online journey and asking for help to seek realignment. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]