Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to examine the Korean's youths' referral patterns to solve their problems. The research participants (857 high school students) were asked to indicate who they would refer themselves to when they encounter different kinds of problems. It was shown that Korean youths seek help from different group depending on the nature of problems. Specifically, they indicated chat peer group is the most frequent referred group for relationship, emotional, and adjustment issues, teachers for career and academic issues, parents for financial and family issues, and self-referred for self-esteem issues. Professional helpers (counselors and psychotherapists) were the least referred group for youths to get help. Somewhat negative attitude toward professional help among youths was shown to be related to their tendency of stigmatizing mental illness. One third of the participants in the study had previous counseling experiences, and chose who received counseling services reported relatively low satisfaction of the services they received. With the limitations of the study, implications for youth counseling were discussed.