The kids are alright—or are they? Here's why every generation looks at the world, and each other, differently.
I’m a late Gen Xer, and completely identify with that label. As teens, we listened to grunge, wore flannel and held a cynical worldview. As kids, we rode our bikes around the neighborhood until our parents called us in for dinner. The last generation to grow up without the internet, we also didn’t have cell phones. Come to think of it, we were more real and honest than these Gen Zers who can’t stop looking at their phones and have to post every detail of their lives on social media. As I get older, I sometimes feel that I just don’t get young people. (Seriously, my generation was the best.)
Is this true? Of course not. But throughout history, and I’m talking centuries, every generation thinks they’re better—more mature, responsible, authentic, ethical—than the ones after them. Before you say, “OK, Boomer” (ahem, those are my parents), I talked to a couple of sociologists to get the real story on what makes each generation feel so different from the one before. Turns out, the tendency to engage in generational clashes is, to quote the Talking Heads, the same as it ever was.
“There are always cultural differences between generations, because people grow up in different times,” says Jennie Bristow, a reader in sociology at Canterbury Christ Church University in the United Kingdom. “But it’s important not to overstate these differences. Young people are fundamentally no different to young people throughout the ages, and all generations have more in common with each other than differences.”
Ahead, Bristow and John Protzko, an assistant professor of psychological science at Central Connecticut State University, explain these often frustrating generational conflicts. Keep reading to find out what’s behind the tendency, and what we can do to all just get along.
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How long have generations been clashing?
Younger and older generations have been at odds since, well, forever. “Generations have been clashing for around 2,500 years in the written record, and almost assuredly as long as there have been people,” Protzko says.
In his fourth-century BCE work Rhetoric, ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote of young people, “They think they know everything, and are always quite sure about it.” Sound familiar? A few hundred years later, in 20 BCE, the Roman poet Horace wrote, “Our sires’ age was worse than our grandsires’. We, their sons, are more worthless than they; so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more corrupt.”
Fast forward to 1624, and we have the Reverend Thomas Barnes writing, “Youth were never more sawcie, yea never more savagely saucie, the ancient are scorned, the honourable are contemned, the magistrate is not dreaded.” Saucy, indeed.
Even in the modern era, the famous song “Kids” from the 1960 musical Bye Bye Birdie describes youth as lazy, disrespectful oafs who can’t speak and don’t listen, and (while we’re on the subject!) ends with a final lament: “Why can’t they be like we were, perfect in every way? What’s the matter with kids today?” This song is just as relevant now as it was when it was written during the rock ‘n’ roll revolution: For example, who can understand Gen Z slang? No cap!
So, generations have been clashing for (literally) millennia. But because of rapid technological progress throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, generational differences became more pronounced because the world literally changed faster.
Why are older and younger generations always in conflict?
The causes of generational conflict through history have their roots in human psychology. “There are always multiple reasons for clashing generations, some unique to the cultures, some unique to societal and technological changes, some rooted in people’s poor memories for how things ‘used to be,'” says Protzko, who has conducted studies on the topic.
Here are the major reasons the generations just can’t understand each other:
Memory bias
This is the main reason for the “kids these days” effect, Protzko says.
“People ‘remember’ themselves in flawed and inaccurate ways, and ‘remember’ other youth of their day in a similarly flawed way,” he says. “Aspects we currently excel at, we ‘remember’ not only being that way in our younger days, but also ‘remember’ people in our day being like us.”
For example, adults who are financially responsible now tend to view the youth in their day as also being financially responsible—as opposed to today’s Gen Z, who, in comparison, may seem incapable of adulting. “When you compare current young people to a flawed, artificially inflated memory, it will always look like decline is occurring,” Protzko says.
Cultural and historical inflection points
Although everyone alive, no matter their age, lives through major events—like World War II, 9/11 or the COVID-19 pandemic—Bristow says young people are likely to be the most affected.
“Significant historical events such as these have a distinctive impact on young people, because they are coming of age and trying to make sense of the world,” she says. “This doesn’t mean the events have a more profound impact on the young than on older people, but there is something particular about the way such events inform their historical consciousness.”
Natural life cycles
In the circle of life, older people always know more because they have lived longer and experienced more things, so young people always seem comparatively naive or ill-prepared for reality. At the same time, young people have always been rebels-with-a-cause, which is to create their own independence from their parents and learn new ways of doing things. This has always been the case through history, but it could be why they see older people as so out of touch.
In research that compares generations, sociologists can’t rely on older people’s flawed recollections of their youth (see memory bias, above). But Bristow says historical data can be used to compare the views of people of the same age but different generations.
“We do have attitudinal surveys going back several decades, which make comparisons possible; and also valuable insights from history and literature,” she says. “But we should always be aware that such comparisons are limited, and avoid drawing deterministic conclusions.”
Do generations even matter?
Generations matter in that they inform the way we see the world. The theory of “social generations”—people born around the same time who are shaped by specific historical events in their formative years—first came about in a 1928 essay by Hungarian sociologist Karl Manheim called “The Problem of Generations,” which became popular when it was published in English in 1952.
“Humans really seem to love putting things into categories, so it is not surprising that we would put people of different ages into categories too,” Protzko says.
As Bristow says, historical and cultural events do influence the worldview of each generation, sometimes drastically. “Generation gaps [have] to do with shifts in historical time. For example, there was a generation gap between the First and Second World Wars, and as a result of the cultural revolution of the 1960s—this was because both those periods involved a huge shift in the social order,” Bristow says. “If there is a generation gap emerging today, it is because we are similarly going through a significant period of accelerated change, with the end of the postwar liberal order,” Bristow says.
To some sociologists, though, labeling specific generations is too arbitrary. “It is highly doubtful that two people born 20 years apart but of the same ‘generation’ had more similar life experiences and influences than two people born two years apart but in different ‘generations,'” Protzko says.
What exactly are the named generations?
If you’re wondering which group you and others fall into, here are the generally accepted years of each generation, which span roughly 15 to 20 years apiece, although the dates aren’t scientifically defined.
Here are the named generations and the birth years associated with each, starting with the first one that was named:
- Lost Generation (1883–1900): Coined by writer Gertrude Stein, this generation, disillusioned by World War I, rejected tradition and began the cultural revolution of the Roaring ’20s.
- Greatest Generation (1901–1927): Named by journalist Tom Brokaw, this generation fought in World War II and is looked back upon as the quintessential American heroes.
- Silent Generation (1928–1945): Coined in a 1951 Time magazine article during the fearful days of the McCarthy era, the Silent Generation was shaped by the Great Depression and World War II, and fought in the Korean War.
- Baby Boomers (1946–1964): This large generation gets its name from the boom in birth rates that occurred after soldiers returned from World War II.
- Generation X (1965–1980): Douglas Coupland coined this name in his 1991 book Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture. “X” alluded to a search for meaning among cynical, skeptical, realistic, independent slackers.
- Millennials (1981–1996): Sometimes called Generation Y, they came of age around the year 2000. Coined by Neil Howe and William Strauss in their 1991 book Generations, Millennials are optimistic and technologically savvy.
- Gen Z (1997–2012): The first “digital natives,” Zoomers are criticized for being coddled or soft, but they’re really more aware of mental health, the importance of asking for help and other topical issues.
- Generation Alpha and Generation Beta (2013–present): Not too much to say about these youngsters yet, except that they have an awful lot of screen time.
Are there benefits to defined generations?
Yes, but it depends on your perspective. “Because members of the same generation came of age in a similar point in time, they do share cultural reference points that inform how they relate to the world, and that is interesting and useful to sociological understanding,” Bristow says.
But as with any label, oversimplifications can lead to stereotyping and bias. “Not every member of the same generation has the same attitude to their historical experience or these reference points—there has always been polarization!” Bristow says. “So we should be very careful not to generalize.”
Recently, the Pew Research Center, under pressure from sociologists who signed an open letter to the organization, decided to no longer use generational names such as “Millennial” or “Boomer” in their studies, and instead refer to cohorts born between certain years.
So how do we stop fighting and learn to get along?
“Humility is a great tool in recognizing you might not really know what it is like to grow up in a different time; you might not know how you would be if the world you grew up in were different,” Protzko says. “Humility in realizing you might not know how things are for different people.”
Try these tips to learn more from other generations:
- Talk to each other. Ask an older person what it was like when they were your age, or ask a younger person what it’s like to grow up today.
- Help other generations. Join an intergenerational program at a senior center, which pairs up younger people with seniors to exchange knowledge and share company. Or, become a mentor for a younger person.
- Be open to change. If you’re older, don’t disparage newfangled technology, but look for ways it can benefit you (then ask a Zoomer for assistance).
- Embrace the past. Historical fiction, biographies and nonfiction about recent eras educate about other age groups and bridge the divide. Start an oral history project with your parents, grandparents or older people in your neighborhood.
- Collaborate at work. Realize that people of different ages bring different skills to the table, so combine them to strengthen your team at work.
Remember: You have more in common than you think, so look for similarities, not differences, with people of different generations. And to paraphrase The Who: I’m talkin’ ’bout my generation too.
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Sources:
- Jennie Bristow, reader in sociology at Canterbury Christ Church University; email interview, December 2025
- John Protzko, assistant professor of psychological science at Central Connecticut State University; email interview, December 2025
- Science: “Kids These Days: Why the Youth of Today Seems Lacking”
- Sociological Review: “Generationalism”
- Acta Psychologica: “Are generations a useful concept?”
- Stanford Report: “What to know about Gen Z”
- Social and Personality Psychology Compass: “Generational identities: Historical and literary perspectives”
- Pew Research Center: “5 things to keep in mind when you hear about Gen Z, Millennials, Boomers and other generations”
- Pew Research Center: “How Pew Research Center will report on generations moving forward”
- Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World: “Embracing Generational Labels: An Analysis of Self-Identification and Political Partisanship”
