“Not Joblessness but A Job I Dislike Scares Me”: Exploring Employment Anxiety

Abstract

An important development task for university students is to complete their education and join the labour market. Therefore, understanding and exploring students' concerns about getting a job seems to be a noteworthy area in supporting their career development. The present study aims to explore the concerns of university students about employment. Semi-structured focus group interviews were conducted with 16 third- and fourth-year Turkish university students (8 females and 8 males) from various departments. The participants responded to questions such as what they thought about finding a job after graduation and how individual and contextual factors affected their concerns. The data were analyzed using thematic analysis in accordance with the Ecological Theory ramework and The Systems Theory Framework of career development. Consequently, employment anxiety appeared in the factors that were individual, close-circle, labor market, and systematic. Further, findings showed that participants also had concerns about underemployment as well as unemployment. In light of the findings, implications and recommendations regarding career counseling and career development were discussed.