What Is Psychological Safety for Young Adults?

As young people mature, leave home, and begin to carve out their own lives, they forge new relationships of all types. For those relationships to flourish, psychological safety is a must. Psychological safety means trusting you can share ideas, concerns, and feelings with others without risk of humiliation or rejection.

Psychological safety is foundational to well-being. When people feel safe, they can connect with others in an authentic way. The safer people feel, the more willing they are to share the best of themselves and form healthy and productive relationships.

Key Takeaways

• Psychological safety is the understanding that you will not be rejected or humiliated for making mistakes or raising ideas, questions, or concerns.
• Because young adults today are more prone to mental health issues and interested in receiving mental health support, they look for work environments that foster psychological safety.
• Young adults in psychologically safe workplaces perform better.
• Over time, the lack of psychological safety in personal and professional relationships can damage young people’s self-esteem and mental health.

What Is Psychological Safety in the Workplace?

Employment is one of the first things young people look for when launching into adulthood. Work can give young people a sense of independence, financially and emotionally. To succeed at work, however, most young adults require psychological safety. In the workplace, psychological safety means trusting that your team members will not embarrass, reject, or admonish you for making suggestions, soliciting feedback, standing out, or taking risks.

Clinical psychologist Carl Rogers originally coined the term “psychological safety” in 1954. Then organizational psychologist William Kahn renewed interest in it back in 1990. He described psychological safety as “being able to show and employ oneself without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career.” In 1999, Harvard Business School professor and organizational behavioral scientist Amy Edmondson introduced the construct “team psychological safety,” defining it as “a shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking.”

The degree of team psychological safety is positively related to team performance, according to a recent survey of 1,149 members of 160 management teams. The survey also showed that the more team members agree on what constitutes team psychological safety, the stronger the impact of psychological safety on team effectiveness.

Why Does Psychological Safety Matter to Young Adults?

Gen Z is coming of age at a time of when climate change, gun violence, racism, sexual harassment, political divisiveness, and the COVID-19 pandemic have converged to heighten social unrest and uncertainty. This generation (born from approximately 1997 to 2012) is more likely than other to report their mental health as fair or poor. Anxiety and depression, both of which affect work performance, are more common in this age group. In fact, a 2022 report by Bain & Company showed that young professionals are more stressed than any other generation.

Examples of Psychological Safety

The modern workplace may be structured in different ways—in-person, hybrid, remote. But the psychological safety that team leaders foster and team members benefit from typically consists of the following elements:

The safety to …

• Share new ideas
• Ask questions
• Raise concerns
• Challenge ideas
• Offer candid feedback
• Take risks
• Ask for help
• Make mistakes
• Be different
• Be vulnerable

When psychological safety has been established, team members don’t fear being embarrassed, ostracized, demoted, or fired for their actions. These might include brainstorming out loud, sharing unfinished thoughts, admitting they don’t understand, challenging the status quo, sharing honest feedback, or simply being imperfect. Moreover, being encouraged and accepted when they speak or act authentically ultimately supports them to perform at a higher level.

3 Ways Psychological Safety Supports Young Adult Mental Health

A team’s psychological safety has an undeniable impact on its members’ mental health, which therefore affects the team’s ability to perform on the job. According to the World Health Organization, high-stress work environments with little social support spawn or worsen the mental health issues Gen Z is already prone to: depression, anxiety, and substance abuse. Psychologically unsafe work environments can also cause sleep problems and concentration issues, not to mention burnout.

On the other hand, when team members feel safe to express themselves, they experience an increased sense of calm and well-being that promotes other mental health benefits. Here are some of the benefits of psychological safety at work.

Increased Self-Worth and Self-Esteem

Young people who experience psychological safety in the workplace will likely feel a heightened sense of self-worth and self-esteem. Self-worth is an intrinsic feeling of your value as a human being, while self-esteem more often fluctuates based on external circumstances. However, being valued, validated, and respected by other team members can’t help but have a positive effect on both. One study found that young people with high self-esteem suffer fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression and fewer problems with attention.

The Ability to Form Authentic Relationships

Young adults on high-performing teams who benefit from the psychological safety their team leaders promote are more likely to form authentic relationships with other team members. Not surprisingly, supportive relationships in which people feel safe to be genuine and vulnerable boost happiness and overall well-being.

The Freedom to Be Yourself

When you work in a psychologically safe workplace, you’re less likely to feel the need to hide behind a mask that doesn’t align with who you really are. Over the long-term, mental health masking, the act of suppressing or camouflaging mental health symptoms in order to fit in, can elevate stress, depression, anxiety, and even suicidal thoughts and behaviors. When your workplace promotes psychological safety, however, you can flourish because vulnerability is permissible.

The Four Stages of Psychological Safety

In his 2019 book, The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety: Defining the Path to Inclusion and Innovation, Dr. Timothy R. Clark outlines four stages teams progress through. Each stage builds upon the next as the team gains greater psychological safety. The four stages include:

1. Inclusion Safety: All human beings have an innate desire to belong. People need to feel included and welcomed onto a team without fear of discrimination. When their gender, age, socioeconomic background, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, neurodiversity, or other defining characteristics are accepted, they feel comfortable being present. Inclusion safety is essential before the other stages can occur.
2. Learner Safety: Humans share the need to learn and grow. At this stage, individuals feel greater psychological safety, such that they ask questions, give and receive feedback, experiment, and feel free to make mistakes.
3. Contributor Safety: This stage satisfies the human desire to make a difference. At this stage, people participate as active and full-fledged team members. They contribute ideas and suggestions. They feel safe using their skills and abilities. They apply what they’ve learned to make a meaningful contribution.
4. Challenger Safety: This stage satisfies the human need to make things better. At this stage, people feel safe to challenge the status quo without fear of repercussions or risks to their reputation. To improve, enhance, or change things for the better, they can question the way the team works. They may also devise new ways of working, and challenge others’ ideas—even those of senior members.

When team leaders develop psychological safety, their employees feel an elevated sense of confidence, engagement, and well-being. Less professionally experienced, young people especially benefit from leaders who take their teams’ well-being into account and consciously look to develop and maintain psychological safety in the workplace.

What Is Psychological Safety in Non-Professional Relationships?

In attachment relationships, like those with family, close friends, and romantic partners, psychological safety is often referred to as “emotional safety.” Feeling emotionally safe means being comfortable sharing your thoughts and feelings with a sibling, parent, girlfriend, boyfriend, or best friend. And it means doing so without worrying about being shamed, judged, or ridiculed.  

Recognizing how you feel in your relationships is important. In emotionally safe relationships, you can relax, knowing that your choices, opinions, and boundaries will be respected. In emotionally unsafe relationships, you may feel as if you’re walking on eggshells to avoid being insulted, criticized, gaslighted, or humiliated in public. These kinds of relationships may not involve physical abuse, but are considered abusive relationships just the same.

What Does Emotional Safety Feel Like?

Couples therapists often use the term “emotional safety” in reference to intimate relationships. But it has broader applications. When you feel emotionally safe at home or with friends, it actually impacts your body. Your heart rate and respiration drop. The muscles in your body relax. You can let down your guard and be who you are. It’s easy to dream out loud and express yourself, whether that means being silly or sad.

Emotional safety allows you to reveal your true self to another person—hurts and hopes, worries and fears. You can share insecurities and even dissatisfactions within the relationship without risk of an explosive argument. In emotionally safe relationships, people trust each other. They give each other the benefit of the doubt in questionable situations.

What Happens When Young Adults Don’t Have Psychological Safety

When you lack psychological safety in relationships, feelings of tension and defensiveness pervade interactions. Because you can’t speak your mind or be vulnerable for fear of being demeaned or attacked, you don an invisible protective shield. And that shield often becomes more and more exhausting to wear. Psychologically unsafe relationships can be devastating to young people’s self-esteem and mental health over time.

In a psychologically unsafe workplace, young people may develop high-functioning anxiety or toxic productivity in an attempt to please supervisors or colleagues. In non-professional relationships, a lack of psychological safety ultimately leads to disconnection and feelings of mistrust, distance, and loneliness. People lose patience with each other. Empathy declines. Relationships start to crumble and can deteriorate irreparably.

When psychologically unsafe relationships cannot be mended after repeated attempts, letting them go is often for the best. However, young adults engaged in these types of relationships may experience trauma. If so, support is essential. This might mean seeking out a mental health counselor, talking to a friend or team member at work, or even leaving a job or relationship for good.

How Newport Institute Treatment Addresses Trauma and the Lack of Psychological Safety

At Newport Institute, we recognize the importance of safety in all kinds of relationships. We also understand the way in which a lack of safety can lead to trauma that affects an individual’s mental health and well-being. Our philosophy of care helps young people gain self-knowledge, heal important relationships, and make healthy choices about the people they spend time with.

Our expert clinicians support young adults ages 18–35 to identify the source of anxiety, depression, substance abuse, or other trauma-related issues. We offer practical tools to build better boundaries and self-regulation, so they can strengthen their relationships and well-being in all areas of life.

In our residential or outpatient programs, we use an integrated approach, treating the whole person through high-quality clinical and medical care as well as experiential and life skills modalities. We assist young adults in finding a sense of emotional and psychological safety that they can replicate outside of Newport Institute as they move toward greater thriving and happiness.

Have questions about mental health treatment for young adults? Contact us for more information and a free young adult mental health assessment.

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