Positive and Negative Experiences of Meranao Adolescent Students During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Narrative Method Analysis

Lockdown, isolation, quarantine, and social distancing are proven to be the only effective measures to prevent and tackle COVID-19 to date. Unfortunately, these measures have caused physical, economical, and mental health problems. Despite a growing interest in the field, scarce narrative studies have delved into adolescents' psychological experiences related to global emergencies caused by infectious diseases. Considering the lack of knowledge in literature and the need to investigate an unexplored topic, a qualitative study was performed to explore adolescents' feelings and thoughts using their narratives. The study was carried out with 150 adolescent students who are continuing their studies in Marawi City. Findings show that adolescents were more forthcoming about their negative experiences than about positive ones. Looking at word occurrence in the two texts (positive and negative experience), many commonalities emerged. Overall, 9 words out of 20 are shared in the vocabulary of the two collected narratives. Looking at the modeling emergent themes analysis, the T-Lab software revealed four themes for each text.