Abstract:
Perceptions about tattoos have recently undergone a fast change and now they are considered as a popular means of self-expression, especially among adolescents and young adults. In the present qualitative study, it is aimed to understand this change by deeply exploring the decision-making processes about having tattoos, the reasons for having tattoos, and the experiences after having tattoos among university students. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 24 university students (12 females and 12 males) aged between 18 and 24 years from eight different cities in Turkey. As a result of the thematic analysis, ten sub-themes emerged under three major themes (i.e. “Deciding on having a tattoo”, “Reasons for having a tattoo”, and “Experiences after the tattoo”). Practical suggestions were given to practitioners within the framework of the findings. © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC part of Springer Nature.