Identity in engineering adulthood: an interpretative phenomenological analysis of early-career engineers in the United States as they transition to the workplace

Huff, J. and Smith, Jonathan A. and Jesiek, B. and Zoltowski, C. and Oakes, W. (2019) Identity in engineering adulthood: an interpretative phenomenological analysis of early-career engineers in the United States as they transition to the workplace. Emerging Adulthood 7 (6), pp. 451-467. ISSN 2167-6968.

Abstract

Prior research has established emerging adulthood to be a time characterized by robust identity explorations in professional and non-professional domains. However, extant literature provides little contextual explanations in relation to how these identity explorations are experienced by early-career professionals. This manuscript presents idiographic findings from a qualitative study that used interpretative phenomenological analysis on interviews with seven engineering students as they transitioned to their respective workplaces. These findings describe how the participants experienced a strong sense of commitment to their career identities while also exploring features of their identities that were unrelated to their careers. Additionally, we discuss how women participants also experienced a gendered form tension in managing their career and family roles. In sum, this manuscript contributes detailed insight regarding coherence and complexity of personal identity development as lived by early-career professionals.

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