A longitudinal study on the transition of meaning-making in work among young adult employees

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the change of meaning-making in work among young adult employees, based on longitudinal data analysis. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 18 business persons who had less than four years of working experiences in Japanese companies, at the time of the first interview. The first interview (T1) was conducted in 2011, and the second interview (T2) in approximately one year after the first interview. The verbal responses of each participant were analyzed by Qualification Method III. Our findings indicate that the change of meaning-making in work among young adult employees 1) waded through 3 steps, "apprentice", "significance of ordeal", and "ascertain way of working", 2) migrated in a certain direction which were shown by the data spatially, suggesting the possibility of formulating a hypothesis on the transition of personal meaning in work up to 5 years from employment in the firm.