Of late, I am being approached by many on issues related to the attitude of the recent generation. Be it the parent of an adolescent, or the manager of the fresh batch of recruits of older Gen Z or young millennials, most of them come with grudges for the difference in the attitude of the younger generation. And that is nothing new. I am sure our preceding generation also had similar complaints. That’s what we call a generation gap.

One cannot deny that the gap is far wider this time. Several factors, like technology advancements, access to the digital medium, and smartphone use by children, are influencing this widening gap. Add to that the never experienced effect of COVID and lockdown. But more of that later.

In this blog, I am just trying to raise a few questions I come across and keep trying to find answers. After all, I am no psychologist!

Let’s start with communication. Yes, every generation has had its communication standards, but the basics of interaction had remained physical. Nowadays, I hardly see much verbal communication between the new generations, leave alone meeting physically. But their hands are hardly free. The thumbs are working overtime. They are communicating non-stop, but just not the way we did.

The 2020 lockdowns of the COVID-19 pandemic forced a radical change on us. The world is not the same and may never be the same anymore. But if we look at the effect on age groups, while it disrupted the older generations, the generation in their pre-teens and teens spent a considerable part of their formative years going through it.

They got habituated to many things that were not normal in our lives before COVID. We can expect its effect on them, and the effect will be very different from what we consider common. Humans are not machines which can be operated by switches. To unlearn is probably the toughest thing in life, typically when there may not be a compelling reason, not because the older generations are asking the new ones to do it!

In my next blog, I will try to cite a few examples for consideration.

As it happens with all, even this new generation has come of age with their unique experiences, societal influences, and technological advancements shaping their psychological landscape in distinct ways. Dismissing that as wrong may not be the best approach for us to take. We must understand them, try hard to find the rationale behind their actions and approach them with a cooperative mindset.