Generation Me Highlights

I read Generation Me by Jean M Twenge, Ph.D.  I would recommend reading this book simply for the wealth of data that shows Generation Me (those born after 1980) is extaordinarily self-absorbed and yet extraordinarily unhappy because of their unrealistic expectations and inflated self-entitlement.  I find this book interesting because it lines up with what teachers around me are saying and what I see in different schools as I teach.

Here are some nuggets:

• “In the early 1950’s, only 12% of teens aged 14-16 agreed with the statement “I am an important person.”  By the late 1980s, and incredible 80%- almost seven times as many- claimed they were important.” Pg. 69
• There is a general agreement among professors and teachers that (according to Professor Stout, pg. 70) “students learn that they do not need to respect their teachers or even earn their grades, so they begin to believe that they are entitled to grades, respect, or anything else… just for asking.”
• In a recent college survey, 98% of freshman agreed with “I am sure that one day I will get to where I want to be in life.”
• In 1999, teens expected to make around $75,000 by the time they were 30.  The average income for a 30-year-old that year was $27,000.
• There was a study that noticed a 42% greater drop in marital satisfaction after having children.  The study concluded that “children seem to be a growing impediment for the happiness of marriages.”  How unfortunate.
• It is noted that 57% of men and 43% of women 22-31 agreed to live with their parents in 2002.  The author attributes this to shrinking salaries, crippling student debt, and the extended period of adolescence that people have now dubbed the “twixter” years.
• In 1967, 45% of freshman agreed that having lots of money was a life goal.  By 2004, 74% agreed.
• The book claims that before 1918, 1% to 2% of Americans experienced a major depressive episode.  Today, the figure is around 15%-20%.
• Using a standard test that measures anxiousness, Twenge compares children from the 1950’s to today.  She found that regular schoolchildren in the 80s reported higher anxiousness levels than child psychiatric patients from the 50’s.
• Twenge notes that now relationships before college are generally characterized as one night stands called “hookups” that are focused on sexual activity with no level of commitment.  This, the author considers, is a reaction to the emotional breakups that are tied with “going steady” with someone.  Generation Me has no qualms with divorcing sex from romantic entanglement.
• The author notes that while Generation Me has a romantic expectation gap that leaves them depressed and unfufilled.  94% of single women in their twenties agreed that “when you marry, you want your spouse to be your soulmate, first and foremost.”  Yet, Twenge details that women will claim they are not looking for the perfect husband , yet in the same breath will detail their idea of a good husband that is unrealistic.
• Generation Me believes, much more than the previous generation and with a strong correlation of .7, that external factors affect their circumstances more than their internal factors such as hard work or ambition.  This leads Twenge to theorize that Generation Me is apathetic about political and religious endeavors, as they agree that “you can’t change things. “
• Similarly, this belief that life is uncontrollable is making Generation Me more and more willing to blame circumstances for their own problems.  This is seen in an 86% increase on product liability cases from 1993-1996.  There are anecdotes that drive me crazy, like the one on page 153, “One young man sued the Wake Forest University Law School because his professors used the Socratic method to question him and his classmates, which, he says, caused him fatigue and weight loss.”  What a joke.
• Pg.155: “One set of parents sued a school that expelled their kids for cheating, saying that a teacher had lef the exam on a desk, making it easy to steal it.”
• There are some upsides, the author states, such as this generations willingness to accept differences.

Please check this book out if you have the time.  I’m sure I’ll have much more to say along these lines in the near future.

Tags: Anxiousness, baby boomers, depression, generation me, generation x, generation y, igeneration, selfishness, society