We are becoming less disciplined, sociable, kind, and emotionally stable than we used to be.
Please, weep for the youngest generation of Americans. We may not be compassionate enough to weep for ourselves.
That is just one of the dismaying takeaways from a new Financial Times column by John Burn-Murdoch on how young people’s minds are changing for the worse. I wrote a piece a couple of weeks ago running through polling data that show how much of Generation Z — awash in social media and moral relativism — has lost its grasp on truth. Burn-Murdoch finds this isn’t the only thing we have lost. Among Americans aged 16 to 39, the personality traits that equip us to do well in life are in sharp decline.
The column looks at what are known as the “Big Five” attributes, the most commonly used psychometric model for measuring and assessing human personalities. Those fundamental factors, identified through years of psychological research, are conscientiousness, openness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Burn-Murdoch writes that conscientiousness, “the quality of being dependable and disciplined,” appears to be the most determinative trait for living well. “Of all personality types, conscientious people tend to fare best on a number of key measures. They live the longest, have the most career success and are less likely to go through divorce. They even manage to hold down a job during recessions.”
Unfortunately, conscientiousness is also the personality attribute that has fallen the most, especially among young adults. A comprehensive study shows that “people in their twenties and thirties in particular report feeling increasingly easily distracted and careless, less tenacious and less likely to make and deliver on commitments.”
Also way down for young people in particular is agreeableness, a measure of politeness and compassion that indicates how kind and cooperative we are. Extroversion, which measures our aptitude for social interaction, has fallen across all age groups, but young people especially. The only personality trait that is up among young adults is neuroticism, a tendency toward negative emotions like anger and sadness, which is “a function of the much-discussed increase in anxiety.”
None of these developments are good. According to the column, research “consistently finds that all these shifts are in the direction associated with negative outcomes down the line. Life is full of challenges. A less committed, less connected and more easily distressed cohort will navigate them less well.”
In short, we are losing the basic tools we need to lead good lives. Harvard professor and former AEI president Arthur Brooks has outlined four “pillars” of a fulfilling life through his extensive research on happiness: faith, family, friendship, and work. Shifting personality traits endanger all of these. Lower conscientiousness means less tenacity and persistence in one’s career. Higher neuroticism translates into less happiness and more strained relationships. Declining extroversion leads to even greater loneliness than young Americans are already suffering. Falling agreeableness may threaten one’s ability to be part of loving community, such as church.
Causes of our changing personalities are surely numerous and should be investigated further, but Burn-Murdoch names a few likely culprits. The digital world that young people grow up in through their smartphones may be “outcompeting real-world commitment.” He writes that “the advent of ubiquitous and hyper-engaging digital media has led to an explosion in distraction, as well as making it easier than ever to either not make plans in the first place or to abandon them.” Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt hypothesized in his book, The Anxious Generation, that social media have effectively “rewired” children’s brains for anxiety and depression — the hallmarks of neuroticism.
Another problem may have been the decision to shut down young Americans’ lives in their formative years. Burn-Murdoch notes that the traits of being outgoing and trusting dropped steeply “during the pandemic, when young people bore the brunt of restrictions on contact in order to protect others from harm. In fact, long the most extroverted group in society, young adults are now the most introverted.” Depriving people of social interaction, it turns out, made them worse at it.
We should not be fatalistic, Burn-Murdoch believes, as, “unlike parental background and genetic make-up, there is a wealth of evidence that personality is malleable — what has been eroded can be rebuilt.” But what has been eroded can also erode further.
At least for now, large swaths of young people are mentally unprepared to cope with the tribulations of adulthood. Relative to their elders, they will face greater difficulty building pillars of purpose amid life’s unruly torrent. Of course, one’s personality traits do not guarantee success or failure. Nothing does. But they can certainly help — or hurt.