Exploratory Study of Adolescents Representations of the Congolese Lushoise Family: Stories and Typical Profiles

The main objective of this article is to present the results of an exploratory study of our ongoing doctoral research, which prepares research on emotional disorders in adolescence related to family experiences. This research has been more motivated by the mental health of adolescents in a society that is transforming like ours. The aim was above all to sketch the different typical profiles of the Congolese Lushoise family made by teenagers starting from the stories, whose age varies between 12 and 17 years, but also to determine the element able to typologize this starting representation. of a speech. To make it concrete, a qualitative and quantitative study was made on the speeches produced by 70 randomly selected young people in the city of Lubumbashi. Their statements were processed using non-computer-assisted thematic analysis. It emerges from this preliminary study, that the family history or the story of family life determines the representation of the family universe, and representations of Congolese teenagers Lush. In a second step, our doctoral research will focus on the research of the most decisive factors in the emergence of emotional disorders (sociological or historical criteria). The results of this first study allowed us to identify four typical family profiles, referring to the influence of family history of adolescents. These are Positive Internal Events, Internal Negative Events, Positive External Events, and Negative External Events.