“Negative and positive experiences form the backbone of my understanding of myself and other people”: School life recollections of young adults

Abstract

The present paper analyses 70 retrospective narratives from young adults about their school life. It looks for answers to the questions of what people and situations young adults recall as sources of positive or negative feelings and how they (re)construct the impacts of school experiences on their lives as young adults. The analysis found that on one hand a cohesive and safe school climate was a source of high self-esteem, well-being and a sense of belonging to the school, while on the other, peer bullying and the difficulties of teachers in coping with complex situations in the classroom were the most persistent problems in the school atmosphere that the young adults recalled as negative. However, the narrators re-construct some negative past experiences into positives, both individually and collectively

Keywords

• schoolchildren
• autobiographic memories
• emotional well-being at school
• young adults
• generational perspective