I was amused by this editorial choice in the LA Times today:
The point of the piece is that we shouldn't stereotype Gen Z. So what's the illustration? A bunch of teen girls stereotypically absorbed in social media. Don't the editors at the Times know that a picture is worth a thousand words?
But set that aside. The op-ed links to a Gallup report from last year about teen well-being. The chapter titles of the report are relentlessly negative, but check out the actual data:¹
I found these results interesting because Gallup asked a slew of very concrete question. As you can see, the number of teens with actively dim views of themselves and the world around them is very small. Even social media doesn't look so bad: only 13% of teens report spending more than about two hours per day on their phones.²
At the same time, about half of these teens reported feeling anxiety or stress the previous day.
This makes me wonder just how good a marker these subjective questions really are. It's well to keep in mind that phrases like "teen angst" and "teen rebellion" are practically cliches, and have been forever. So is it meaningful that teens report a lot of anxiety these days when their answers to more concrete questions are almost never negative?
And today's teens are optimistic! 80% think they have a great future. 84% think they'll achieve their goals. 85% think their life will be pretty good five years from now (7 or more on a scale of 0-10). An astonishing 38% think they will do something that changes the world. Maybe they're a little too optimistic?³
Obviously a single survey can only tell us a limited amount. And this is a snapshot in time, so we don't know how it compares to the past. Still, it's startling how big the disconnect is between soft answers (anxiety, stress) and hard answers (life is good, I always get enough to eat). Which ones should we really trust?
¹In this chart, I'm counting teens who gave an actively negative answer. In other words, it doesn't include those who reported things like "fair" or "neither agree or disagree." The point here is to find out how many teens are truly unhappy with life, not just "meh."
²The data is reported in bins (1-5, 6-10, etc), which is why it's "about" two hours.
³Not everything was rosy. 72% of teens want to get a BA or graduate degree, for example, but nearly a quarter are afraid they can't afford it. Click the link and look at the full set of questions yourself if you want a fuller picture.
"Even social media doesn't look so bad: only 13% of teens report spending more than about two hours per day on their phones.²"
But back in 2023, Gallup reported:" 51% of U.S. teenagers spend at least four hours daily on social media."
Also, Kevin, "social media" does note equal "phones." Teens access the Internet for all kinds of things using their phones. Teens don't consider gaming online to be "social media." Until very recently I taught high school full time. The phones are used for all kinds of things in high school, and then kids turn around and use laptops when they're not using their phones.
So if teens report being okay, it's not because they are using their phones less or accessing social media less (WHICH IS NOT THE SAME THING!).
Don't the editors at the Times know that a picture is worth a thousand words?
the platinum blonde queen bee is just clickbait
Teens are great! Well, except maybe for the several who were involved in that KC shooting the other day. And that subway shooting in NY. And the couple of thugs (13 yo) who killed a Michigan teenager who stopped to give them a ride on a cold winter night last year.
Well, you get the point. Of course teens are fine. The fact that a few hundred kill shoot at each other, beat each other, and kill is just something we can live with. No bother at all. Why would I even bother you with it?
Yes, like their parents teens are plenty mature enough to handle any kind of firearms they can get their hands on.
It's well to keep in mind that phrases like "teen angst" and "teen rebellion" are practically cliches, and have been forever.
Ah, yes... but what about teen spirit, eh? There's the rub.
Yup. In every generation there are some troubled kids while most of the kids are more or less fine, but the troubled kids get all the attention because they are more visible. People who have problems, act out, and are not well are always far more noticeable than people who are doing fine and following social norms, so their numbers are always overestimated by everyone not using hard data.