Young People's Communication Difficulties: Experiences with Employers and Family Adults

Abstract

ABSTRACT Communication between teenagers and employers is an important research topic, but has been neglected relative to research on communication between young people and other adults, such as parents. The present paper describes an open-ended questionnaire survey in which 1500 young people aged between 12 and 20 recounted a difficult communication experience with either an employer or a family adult, addressing the reason for difficulty, whether the difficulty was resolved, and how it was resolved. Communications with family adults were found to be difficult because of the lack of a shared point of view or because of an unwillingness to hurt the adult's feelings. However, difficulties with employers were attributed to the teenager's lack of courage, the nature of the relationship or a lack of communication skill. Difficult communications with family adults were equally likely to be resolved as unresolved, whereas those with employers were more likely to be resolved than unresolved. Finally, difficult communications with employers were most likely to be resolved through the teenager finding the courage, whilst those with family adults were most likely to be resolved through the teenager attempting to understand the other's point of view. The implications for future research of these findings are discussed.