Exploring the phenomenological structure of existential anxiety as lived through transformative life experiences

The purpose of this study is to offer a systematic phenomenological approach to explore existential anxiety, typically defined as the experience of becoming aware of the universal concerns including death, meaninglessness, freedom and loneliness. It focuses on in-depth exploration of Transformative Life Experiences (TLE), events which often induce radical and profound reorganization of one's life.

Data was collected through in-depth interviews with 150 adults who self-identified and accounted for a TLE in their lives. Data analysis was guided by a hermeneutic phenomenology paradigm that postulates that people account for their experience within the four lifeworld existentials of temporality, spatiality, corporality (embodiment), and relationality.

A heuristic model was developed as an attempt to bridge the gap between the theoretical notion of existential anxiety and how it is subjectively experienced by interviewees.

Implications of the model for further research and practice are discussed, particularly the ability to identify a dominant universal concern, even when implicit, based on an exploration of one's subjective account of TLE.