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Help-Seeking Pattern & Supportive Network of Working Youths in - Executive Summary

In view of the different problems and stresses faced by young people, the Commission on Youth initiated studies on the supportive system for youth. The Phase I study was targetted for secondary schools students and the report was published in June 1995. This report is developed from the study Phase II study for working youths aged 15 to 24.

Research Objectives

The major objectives of this study were:

  • to explore the nature of problems that working youths generally encountered;
  • to investigate the tendency of working youths in seeking help from others;
  • to identify the major sources of support for working youths;
  • to study the expectation of working youths on various supportive system;
  • to draw up recommendations on how to enhance the supportive network of working youths.

Research Framework

The basic structure of the conceptual framework of the Phase I study was adopted in the present study:


Research Methodology

This study was conducted in two phases, the focus group discussions and the quantitative survey:

  • Phase I: Focus Group Discussions
    Focus groups with working youths were conducted to discuss on the sources of stress, supportive systems and recommendations on enhancing their social support. These focus groups were also used to exhaust items of stressful situations encountered by working youths. A total of 66 working youths in various occupations were invited to join these focus groups.
  • Phase 2: Quantitative Survey
    The survey was conducted by the International Research Associates (HK) Ltd., followed by a secondary analysis by the researcher. A total of 1,500 face to face interviews were conducted with randomly selected working youths aged between 15 and 24 in domestic households across the territory of Hong Kong. The field work was conducted between April and May, 1996 and a successful rate of 74% among the eligible households was reported.

Characteristics of Respondents

  • Demographic Data
    There were 51% male respondents and 49% females. About 29% of the respondents were aged 15-19, and 71% aged 20-24. There was a higher percentage of male respondents (55%) than female respondents (45%) in the age category of 15-19; while for the age category of 20-24, there was an even sex distribution.
  • Level of self-esteem
    The Rosenberg self-esteem scale (Rosenberg, 1965) was administered to the respondents. The self-esteem score was adjusted in the survey with a range from 9 to 36, with the higher the score, the lower the self-esteem. The mean self-esteem score of the respondents was 19.4, with 19.1 for males and 19.6 for females; 20.1 for the group aged 15-19 and 19.1 for the group aged 20-24. Around 15% of the respondents would be classified as having negative self-esteem of the mid-point of the final scale was used as the point of demarcation.
  • Educational Attainment
    In the sample of respondents, nearly 5% of the respondents did not complete F.3 education; around 12% finished the junior secondary education; 5% studied up to F.4; 50% completed F.5; 12% matriculated; 4% joined the technical institutes; and 12% had post-secondary education.
  • Employment status
    Among the sample, about 10% were not employed at the time of interview. The unemployment situation for the younger respondents was up to 17% while for the older group was about 7%. Among the youths unemployed, 75% were looking for a job and they had spent an average of 2.5 months in job-hunting. On the contrary, about 25% had no intention to look for a full-time job.
    Among the youths being employed, 50% were working as unskilled white collar and 33% as unskilled blue collar. Another 8% and 5% of the respondents were engaged in skilled white collar and skilled blue collar respectively. Only small proportion of the respondents were engaged in other types of occupation. Among these employed youths, the average monthly income was $9,273 for the whole sample; $9,308 for males and $9,237 for females; $7,268 for youths aged 15-19 and $9,991 for youths aged 20-24.
  • New Arrivals from China
    In the whole sample of respondents, there were about 3% new arrivals from China, living in Hong Kong for not more than 7 years. The percentages of new arrivals in the age category of 15-19 and 20-24 working youths were 4% and 2.8% respectively. Among these new arrivals, up to 21% have not completed F.3. The unemployment rate among this group of respondents was about 4%.

Help-seeking Profile

A total of 9 life dimensions were included in the study to explore the sources of stress to working youths, their perception of the potential stressors and their supportive network.

1. Stress Profile
Across the nine life dimensions, the common life stressors were shown in the order of descending frequency:

Life dimension Average frequency score
1. Finance 2.29
2. Personal Emotions 2.19
3. Work 2.00
4. Family relationships 1.85
5. Peer relationships 1.83
6. Health & Appearance 1.77
7. Love affairs 1.54
8. Social Issues 1.48
9. Sex-related issues 1.42

Average frequency scores range from 1 (never) to 4 (always)

2. Perceived stress of situations
On the average, working youths found the life dimensions most stressful in the descending order of:

Life dimension Average score of perceived stress
of situations in the life dimension
1. Finance 2.74
2. Family relationships 2.63
3. Personal emotions 2.51
4. Peer relationships 2.38
5. Health & Appearance 2.35
6. Love affairs 2.32
7. Work 2.31
8. Sex-related issues 1.90
9. Social Issues 1.51

Average scores range from 1 (not stressful at all) to 4 (very stressful)

3. Perceived embarrassment of situations
On the average, working youths found most embarrassed if they were to seek help in the life dimensions in the descending order of:

Life dimension Average score of perceived embarrassment
of situations in the life dimension
1. Sex-related issues 2.10
2. Finance 1.89
3. Love affairs 1.56
4. Family relationships 1.50
5. Peer relationships 1.45
6. Personal emotions 1.44
7. Work 1.40
8. Health & Appearance 1.24
9. Social Issues 1.21

Average scores range from 1 (not embarrassed at all) to 4 (very embarrassed)

4. Supportive Network
When working youths were asked to indicate their choices of supportive systems, on the general average, the order of popularity was shown to be friends (52%), self (45%), boy/girl friend (18%), mothers (17%), colleagues (12%) and fathers (11%).

5. Most effective source of help
When working youths were asked to indicate the most effective source of help, they tended to rely on themselves (30%) and their friends (29%). Boy/girl friends, mothers and fathers were considered to be the most helpful systems by 9%, 8% and 3% of the respondents respectively.

Expected and Actual support

Working youths were asked to choose the kinds of social support they expected and those actually received from each of the supportive systems.

  • Parents
    Working youths expected concern (62% and 71%), advice (51% and 51%) and reinforcement (37% and 38%) from their fathers and mothers respectively. It appears that the actual concern (47% and 67%), advice (46% and 50%) and reinforcement (20% and 28%) received from their fathers and mothers could not live up to their expectations.
  • Peers
    The types of support expected from peers were mostly advice (other friends 75%; colleagues 68%), which they actually received (74% and 65% respectively). Other friends were also expected to keep working youths company (59% vs 55% actual) and to show concern (50% vs 48% actual). Colleagues were however expected to show reinforcement (36%) but fell short of real life experience (21%).
    Boyfriends or girlfriends were expected to show concern (72%) and to give advice (59%). These concerns and advice failed to live up to the expectations in actual situations (53% and 47% respectively).

Recommendations

From the results of the quantitative and the opinions raised by the working youths in the focus groups, a number of recommendations were made:

  • Enhancing further training and development opportunities
    • skills upgrading for the employed youths
    • further education for the under-educated
    • vocational training or apprenticeship for the unemployed
  • Developing new direction for social services
    • financial management
    • heterosexual or interpersonal relationship
    • assertiveness training
    • stress management
  • Broadening the scope of leisure activities
  • Maintaining family as a safety network
  • Developing early career guidance programme
  • Promoting the Concept of human resources development