Conservatism and participation in its core institutions - marriage, church, and the military - are associated with better mental health. Gen Z, however, is rejecting these beliefs and behaviors.
It’s possible that the rigors of boot camp weed out the mentally shaky. My stepson, who recently went through boot camp, witnessed quite a few people get tossed out purely because they couldn’t hack it, mentally.
Also, is it possible to compare the data to the same age spreads in previous eras? What I mean is, back in the 1990s, when Gen Xers were 18-25, how was their mental health compared to all older generations? Just want to make sure this isn’t just the self-reported drama and ennui of youth, a sort of Hamlet complex, if you will.
Great points! These are exactly the kinds of things that were on my mind while I was writing this piece. For all of these variables (but especially for military service) I can't really rule out what is a selection effect (i.e. people are mentally healthy so they choose marriage, military service, religious engagement, etc.) versus a transformative effect (i.e. people were mentally unhealthy but then became mentally healthy as a result of the experience of being married, serving in the military, attending religious services, etc.) with the data I have. As your stepson's experience suggests, those who are currently serving (or those that have served) have done at least two things that make them distinct from the rest of the population: (1) volunteered to serve; and (2) survived boot camp. In other words, they are likely to be mentally tougher than the average person. It's unsurprising, then, that we would see better mental health among this group. Still, it is possible that some experience a transformative effect as well. Unfortunately, I just can't say with the data I have (so I tried not to).
Your comment about comparing this generation to pervious generations is also spot on. Whenever you are trying to do analyses like this you have to be aware of and attempt to control for aging effects (changes that every group goes through as they age), period effects (big events that change people of all ages simultaneously) and generational effects (unique experiences that define the perspectives of people born in a particular era). The concern here is that we are seeing an aging effect (i.e. all young adults are angst-filled....we just happen to be surveying this particular generation of angst-y teens right now) rather than a generational effect.
Sadly, we don't have good enough data to sort all of this out. For example, we don't have much data on young adults (e.g. 18-25) going back very far (mostly because the mental health questions don't get asked until pollsters already believe there is a mental health crisis). So, we can't compare Gen X to Gen Z apples-to-apples.
What we do have, however, is a very rich data source on high school students going back to the 1980s (called the Monitoring the Future Study). These surveys ask a whole host of mental health questions of nationally representative samples. Using this, we can see whether Gen X teenagers of the 1990s (like me) are really different from teenagers today. If you look at Figure 2, you will see the changes on three of the mental health items over time (comparing 1990s teenagers to 2023 teenagers). This suggests there really is something different going on this time. All of the graphs on mental health are summarized here if you are interested: https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1680003328640528384. As you can see, the inflection point is really somewhere between 2010 and 2013. Prior to that, there was very little change across generations.
Relatedly (or maybe not?), the MTF data also tracks drinking, drug use, sex, smoking cigarettes and a host of other activities. What's fascinating is that these have all dramatically declined among high school students since the 1990s. I might write something on that at some point.
In any event, thanks for reading and thanks for the comment! I hope the response was helpful!
KW, thanks so much for the thorough response - much appreciate you taking the time to work with both my comments. On the first point, I wonder if there's not both factors at play (selection and transformation). People who possess at least the impetus toward better mental health (and perhaps would score higher on resiliency measures) select healthier environments and activities, and then they additionally get a boost in transformation from those environments and activities.
On the second point, thanks for answering that question. That's fascinating, and given David Zweig's work on the effects of social media, I can definitely see Gen Z spiking anomalously, perhaps due to that factor dovetailing with several others (as an overall result of what happens to young people during the decline of empire). I'll be very interested to see your discussion on the decline in vices with Gen Z, too.
As a parent of three in Gen Z, your cogent analysis rings true. Even within my family, I see mental health differences based on several of the characteristics mentioned.
In the data you examined, is there anything about the feeling of the larger culture? Every decade has felt quite different to me - but it feels right now that the culture at large is uncertain of the future, and pessimistic. Where is the ‘morning in America’ to give optimism of the future?
Thanks for the comment! The piece was motivated, in part, by my desire to put some hard numbers behind what I (and many others) see unfolding in their own social circles. I'm happy to hear that you found something useful in it!
There are a couple of different measures of "optimism" out there (but none in the CES data that I used for this piece). The most prominent is the right track/wrong track question from Gallup (https://news.gallup.com/poll/1669/general-mood-country.aspx). This time series shows only 18% of Americans are "satisfied" with the way things are going in the country (down from more than 40% in January 2020). Perhaps a better measure is Gallup's question about whether the next generation will have a better life than their parents (https://news.gallup.com/poll/403760/americans-less-optimistic-next-generation-future.aspx). These numbers have shown less movement over time but Republicans are becoming more pessimistic recently. The problem with Gallup data is: (1) it is not typically publicly available; and (2) it does not have large enough sample sizes to disaggregate by generation.
A final data source is the Monitoring the Future Survey of high school students. Zach Goldberg has recently done some nice analyses by gender and partisanship (https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1680003670304251906/photo/1). He looks at the question "The future often seems hopeless" (agree or disagree). Here, there is a massive liberal spike after 2010.
If progressive ideology and homosexuality have such a disastrous impact on one's well being, then why are they so vigorously promoted by virtually all influential institutions in the West?
It’s possible that the rigors of boot camp weed out the mentally shaky. My stepson, who recently went through boot camp, witnessed quite a few people get tossed out purely because they couldn’t hack it, mentally.
Also, is it possible to compare the data to the same age spreads in previous eras? What I mean is, back in the 1990s, when Gen Xers were 18-25, how was their mental health compared to all older generations? Just want to make sure this isn’t just the self-reported drama and ennui of youth, a sort of Hamlet complex, if you will.
Great points! These are exactly the kinds of things that were on my mind while I was writing this piece. For all of these variables (but especially for military service) I can't really rule out what is a selection effect (i.e. people are mentally healthy so they choose marriage, military service, religious engagement, etc.) versus a transformative effect (i.e. people were mentally unhealthy but then became mentally healthy as a result of the experience of being married, serving in the military, attending religious services, etc.) with the data I have. As your stepson's experience suggests, those who are currently serving (or those that have served) have done at least two things that make them distinct from the rest of the population: (1) volunteered to serve; and (2) survived boot camp. In other words, they are likely to be mentally tougher than the average person. It's unsurprising, then, that we would see better mental health among this group. Still, it is possible that some experience a transformative effect as well. Unfortunately, I just can't say with the data I have (so I tried not to).
Your comment about comparing this generation to pervious generations is also spot on. Whenever you are trying to do analyses like this you have to be aware of and attempt to control for aging effects (changes that every group goes through as they age), period effects (big events that change people of all ages simultaneously) and generational effects (unique experiences that define the perspectives of people born in a particular era). The concern here is that we are seeing an aging effect (i.e. all young adults are angst-filled....we just happen to be surveying this particular generation of angst-y teens right now) rather than a generational effect.
Sadly, we don't have good enough data to sort all of this out. For example, we don't have much data on young adults (e.g. 18-25) going back very far (mostly because the mental health questions don't get asked until pollsters already believe there is a mental health crisis). So, we can't compare Gen X to Gen Z apples-to-apples.
What we do have, however, is a very rich data source on high school students going back to the 1980s (called the Monitoring the Future Study). These surveys ask a whole host of mental health questions of nationally representative samples. Using this, we can see whether Gen X teenagers of the 1990s (like me) are really different from teenagers today. If you look at Figure 2, you will see the changes on three of the mental health items over time (comparing 1990s teenagers to 2023 teenagers). This suggests there really is something different going on this time. All of the graphs on mental health are summarized here if you are interested: https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1680003328640528384. As you can see, the inflection point is really somewhere between 2010 and 2013. Prior to that, there was very little change across generations.
Relatedly (or maybe not?), the MTF data also tracks drinking, drug use, sex, smoking cigarettes and a host of other activities. What's fascinating is that these have all dramatically declined among high school students since the 1990s. I might write something on that at some point.
In any event, thanks for reading and thanks for the comment! I hope the response was helpful!
KW, thanks so much for the thorough response - much appreciate you taking the time to work with both my comments. On the first point, I wonder if there's not both factors at play (selection and transformation). People who possess at least the impetus toward better mental health (and perhaps would score higher on resiliency measures) select healthier environments and activities, and then they additionally get a boost in transformation from those environments and activities.
On the second point, thanks for answering that question. That's fascinating, and given David Zweig's work on the effects of social media, I can definitely see Gen Z spiking anomalously, perhaps due to that factor dovetailing with several others (as an overall result of what happens to young people during the decline of empire). I'll be very interested to see your discussion on the decline in vices with Gen Z, too.
As a parent of three in Gen Z, your cogent analysis rings true. Even within my family, I see mental health differences based on several of the characteristics mentioned.
In the data you examined, is there anything about the feeling of the larger culture? Every decade has felt quite different to me - but it feels right now that the culture at large is uncertain of the future, and pessimistic. Where is the ‘morning in America’ to give optimism of the future?
Thank you for writing about this important topic.
Thanks for the comment! The piece was motivated, in part, by my desire to put some hard numbers behind what I (and many others) see unfolding in their own social circles. I'm happy to hear that you found something useful in it!
There are a couple of different measures of "optimism" out there (but none in the CES data that I used for this piece). The most prominent is the right track/wrong track question from Gallup (https://news.gallup.com/poll/1669/general-mood-country.aspx). This time series shows only 18% of Americans are "satisfied" with the way things are going in the country (down from more than 40% in January 2020). Perhaps a better measure is Gallup's question about whether the next generation will have a better life than their parents (https://news.gallup.com/poll/403760/americans-less-optimistic-next-generation-future.aspx). These numbers have shown less movement over time but Republicans are becoming more pessimistic recently. The problem with Gallup data is: (1) it is not typically publicly available; and (2) it does not have large enough sample sizes to disaggregate by generation.
A final data source is the Monitoring the Future Survey of high school students. Zach Goldberg has recently done some nice analyses by gender and partisanship (https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1680003670304251906/photo/1). He looks at the question "The future often seems hopeless" (agree or disagree). Here, there is a massive liberal spike after 2010.
I hope this helps! Thanks for reading!
If progressive ideology and homosexuality have such a disastrous impact on one's well being, then why are they so vigorously promoted by virtually all influential institutions in the West?