Metaphorical Perceptions of High School Students in Rural Area Related to Career, Profession, and Job Concepts

This study aims to reveal the metaphorical perceptions of Turkish high school students in rural area about the concepts of career, profession, and job. The participants consisted of 160 (82 females and 78 males) high school students in the rural area. Participants are 10th (n=65), 11th (n=40), and 12th-grade (n=55) students. In order to reveal the metaphorical perceptions of the students about the concepts of career, profession, and job, each student was asked to complete the sentences of ''career is like ... '' and '' because it is ... ''; ''profession is like ... '' and '' because it is ... '' and 'job is like ... '' and '' because it is ... ''. In this study, the phenomenology design was used and the data were analyzed by content analysis. Participants created total of 121 metaphors related to the career concept, 73 metaphors related to the profession concept, and 108 metaphors related to the job concept. The results are discussed basing on the career psychological counseling literature and presented suggestions for future studies.