In the same boat: social support in online peer groups for career counseling

Abstract

The success and growth of online peer groups has evoked interest in their potential to provide support for their members who share similar challenges. While there is a growing body of knowledge in this field, there is still a lack of understanding social support in online peer groups for career counseling, a prevention for youth unemployment. The unique dataset underlying our explorative study contains messages written by pupils in online peer groups for career counseling at the German Federal Employment Agency. Applying content analysis and logistic regression analysis we analyze which types of social support arise in the online peer groups depending on peers’ characteristics. We show that the online peer groups provide types of social support traditional one-on-one counseling cannot offer. Our analysis indicates that depending on peers’ gender and average school grade, the prevalence of the different types of social support changes. To a smaller extent this is also the case for differences in migration background. Our results contribute to a better understanding of social support in online peer groups for career counseling to address youth unemployment.