What The Wild Things Are

Understandings of Self, Awareness, and Mental Health in an Ever-Changing World

by Samantha Smithstein, Psy.D.

Are today’s youth even more self-absorbed (and less caring) than generations before?

Have kids today stopped caring about others?

Published on June 5, 2010 by Samantha Smithstein, Psy.D. in What The Wild Things Are

Earlier this week, Sara Konrath, a researcher at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, released her results on a study analyzing and comparing empathy among college students over the last 30 years. The results? The "biggest drop in empathy" in recent history. She writes, "College kids today are about 40 percent lower in empathy than their counterparts of 20 or 30 years ago."

Find a Therapist

Search for a mental health professional near you.

Find Local:

• Acupuncturists
• Chiropractors
• Massage Therapists
• Dentists
• and more!

In related survey research, psychologist Jean Twenge has labeled the current generation of young people the "iGeneration," or "Generation Me". In her books she describes how young people today "take it for granted that the self comes first," and has labeled this time a "narcissism epidemic," stating that we are "living in the age of entitlement." Konrath and O'Brien link the self-absorption and lack of empathy together,calling the current generation "one of the most self-centered, narcissistic, competitive, confident and individualistic in recent history... It's not surprising that this growing emphasis on the self is accompanied by a corresponding devaluing of others."
There are some who argue that this description fits most teens and young adults and is appropriate to some degree for everyone in this developmental phase of life. However, both researchers compare similarly aged kids from other generations and the difference is striking.
This difference raises the question of why? Researchers Konrath and O'Brien hazard a few guesses, most related to the increase in exposure to and use of media. For example, many in this current generation have had repeated lifetime exposure to violent video games and films, and there is a growing body of research suggesting that violent video games (and perhaps films) are a cause of increased aggressive behavior, thoughts, and feelings, and a decrease in empathy and prosocial behavior across both gender and culture. Additionally, the researchers surmise that the ease of having (and ignoring or dumping) online "friends" may make it easy to tune out when they don't feel like responding to the distress of others, and may carry over offline as well. They also add that the inflated expectations of success fueled by "reality shows" creates a socialenvironment that encourages self-focus and works against slowing down and listening to someone who needs a bit of sympathy.
Obviously, any statements about an entire generation are not true of every person in that generation. Clearly there are young people today who are deeply empathic and caring. But the general trends and statistics are alarming, and it would behoove those of us in a position to influence today's youth to pay attention and be proactive about it while we can. Paying attention to the forces that influence children and young people so that they can grow up to be empathic is not only better for them, but ultimately better for us all.

photo: Maybe they aren't all bad: these college kids have just donated the clothing off their back. (Erich Schlegel/AP Images for AXE)

Why are the youth of today so rude?

They have no conversation, don't listen and refuse to take an interest in anyone else... a survey reveals that this generation has few manners. How did it happen, asks Thomas Blaikie?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/3653126/Why-are-the-youth-of-today-so-rude.html

Young people have always been rude, far ruder than anybody else. It goes back at least as far as Jane Austen. Remember how, in Emma, Frank Churchill left all the doors open, exposing poor fragile Mr Woodhouse to a draught? Even the Queen, aged 19, knocked off a policeman's helmet on VE Day, so she once told the writer Hammond Innes.

But the young of today are worse than preceding generations. This is the depressing conclusion of a survey by the Left-wing think tank Demos.

Employers questioned say that graduate recruits lack ''soft'' skills; they don't know how to have a conversation, aren't very flexible, don't listen properly and don't know enough about customer relations or even how to be polite to customers. These attributes, employers say, are more valuable than degrees - or would be if young people had them.

It is, however, the degree of rudeness that especially bothers employers. According to the Demos survey, the past 10 years have seen a noticeable deterioration.

We've all heard about it, either at dinner parties or through direct experience. We've known about the graduate recruits who, six not very impressive months into their first job, are demanding to be allowed to set up and run their own branch of the business.

Or, the young whippersnapper who is kindly taken out for a welcoming lunch by their new boss. What do they do? Glance at the menu to find the most expensive thing (these types are known as ''lobsters'' after their favourite choice) and then precede to bore the well-meaning boss rigid with a blow-by-blow account of the latest antics on Big Brother.

Rudeness becomes blazingly apparent when anybody tries to confront the young person about their conduct. A common response to the mildest telling-off is: ''I'm sorry I seem to have upset you", as if it were all the other person's problem and the wretched youth need take no responsibility at all.

And if you were to go as far as suggesting to a young person that, in order to participate in conversation generally, he or she really ought to know who the Prime Minister is or what is meant by ''the Establishment'', you will be greeted by purple-faced outrage worthy of a pre-war colonel, albeit with a rather different vocabulary.

No, the young have never been so complacent, pleased with themselves, demanding, unco-operative and downright rude - and seemingly unaware of it. Everyone over 35 has long suspected this. The Demos survey proves it. So, if you feel that you haven't really got going with complaining about them, now's your chance.

But, hang on a minute. I don't want to spoil the fun but shouldn't we try to be fair? Social ineptitude, lack of confidence, shyness, intense self-absorption - these are the afflictions of the young. To some extent they can't help it. They just don't have enough experience, awareness of others and knowledge to cope. We mustn't make unreasonable demands upon them.

Nevertheless, the question remains: why are they so much worse? To some extent it is surprising. After all, education nowadays is less competitive (no more exam results in rank order pinned on the notice board for all to see) and school-children are formally assessed at GCSE not just for their speaking skills but for their listening ones as well.

A lot of schoolwork is done in groups and teams where pupils are encouraged to co-operate with each other, yet employers are complaining that new recruits can't work in teams.

The sad truth is that a lot of the ''teams'' at school aren't teams at all, but one poor sucker doing all the work while the others flick through the latest Heat magazine.

There is also no escaping the brutal results-driven, league-table culture in schools and universities from which new graduate employees emerge. Ultimately, pupils know that their performance is the only one that matters.

Often, encouraged by their parents, they see school as a service; they are the consumers. When they are not banging on the staff room door, demanding extra help, they are e-mailing their teachers at dead of night, making further demands. It is not surprising that they transfer this attitude on to their employers; what are they there for but to provide them with the job interest and financial reward that they require?

This basically selfish approach explains other failures highlighted in the survey - lack of creativity, for instance. An inability to talk to people (so vital in the workplace - or at least it was before e-mail), on the other hand, arises first and foremost from the failure of parents to provide their children with a grounding in basic manners.

Many middle-class parents appear to believe that ''manners'' are some kind of appalling spiritual restriction on their darling child's individuality. How dreadful that little Ben or Zoe should have to take a polite interest in Aunt Marge's adored collection of house plants. In many households a separatist regime is operated where the children either eat in another room or appear at the table only intermittently during meals. They don't talk to adults, they don't ask or answer questions, they have no small-talk, they don't learn anything; they are stuck in the narrow perimeters of their own interests and experience.

Indeed, childhood is one long self-indulgence. It's no wonder that, thrust into the workplace, confronted by all kinds of different people, new recruits are completely at sea. They have no idea of how to take an interest in something just because somebody else is interested in it.

Education and parenting are also at fault in producing many young people with a boffin mentality. They are encouraged too much to pursue their own interests. General knowledge is frowned upon. The result: a young person who knows all about the dolphins or how a desalination plant works but is still, as Jane Austen said of Mrs Bennett, a person of ''mean information'' - pig ignorant in other words.

It could hardly be any worse, but there's more. ''Youth'' culture has never before been so markedly divided off from mainstream culture. Big Brother is the shining (and, at times, horrific) example but there is a mass of television, music, even literature, aimed specifically at under 25s that the rest of us have never heard of.

The new survey undoubtedly reveals a big problem. We know now why offices all over the country are unsatisfactorily divided along age lines as they never were before. But, awful as they might seem, don't blame the young people. At least not entirely. It's not all their fault. And, as the Demos concludes, it's up to employers to find a way to solve the problem.

• Blaikie's Guide to Modern Manners by Thomas Blaikie (4th Estate) is available for £10 plus £1.25 p&p. To order, please call Telegraph Books on 0870 428 4112