Are millennials the elite generation? (And are people actually getting dumber?)

Summary

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Podcast Summary: NO SUCH THING

Episode: Are Millennials the Elite Generation? (And Are People Actually Getting Dumber?)

Hosts: Manny Fadell, Noah Friedman, Devin Joseph
Air Date: July 15, 2026
Guests: Elizabeth Dwarak (Assistant Professor, Northwestern University), Jean Twenge (Professor, San Diego State University; Author, "Generations")

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Overview

This episode digs into the popular perception that millennials may be the “elite” generation, examining whether people are genuinely getting dumber, and how generational differences play into broader cultural trends. The hosts—three self-described best friends and journalists—take a research-driven approach, talking through their own generational identities, diving into academic studies about intelligence, and speaking with two expert guests. The discussion balances humor, skepticism, and a genuine desire to challenge stereotypes about age, intelligence, and culture.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. What Are Generations, Anyway?

• Defining the Generations:
  • The hosts debate (01:05–03:14) where the lines fall (Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, Gen Z, Gen Alpha, “Gen Beta”).
  • Skepticism about generational categories:
    • Noah: “It seems like… we're just talking about people of a certain age in this time period versus, like, we're actually so different from one another.” (02:56)
  • Personal identification vs. demographer's labels:
    • Devin references Kanye West identifying as a millennial, despite being Gen X (01:51–02:28).

2. Millennials: The Bridge Generation

• Millennials’ Unique Experience:

  • Manny: “We remember times when we didn't have phones. Gen Z doesn't… We remember the old world, so to speak.” (03:40–03:52)
  • The internet “grew up with us,” as opposed to Gen Z, who inherited an already connected world.

• Are Millennials the Greatest? (Satirical/self-reflective)

  • Devin: “That's kind of why we're the greatest generation of all time. And it's all downhill.” (04:26)
  • The hosts discuss how millennials experienced a “sweet spot”—valuing knowledge-seeking without being fully tethered to phones or the internet (04:42–05:12).
  • “Every new generation was smarter than the generations past… I think this is the turning point where we're gonna see a dip [in intelligence].” – Devin (07:18–07:20)

3. Exploring If People Are Getting “Dumber”

The Flynn Effect and Its Reverse

• Expert Segment: Elizabeth Dwarak Interview (08:52–19:54)
  • What is IQ?
    • “IQ is the standardized way of measuring cognitive ability… Some people say that it's literally just the test of everyday life.” – Elizabeth (09:24)
    • Breakdown: Fluid intelligence (processing/memory), crystallized (skills/knowledge), spatial (e.g., rotating shapes).
    • Fun example: “If you're playing Legend of Zelda… how well can you rotate it in your head?” (10:34)
  • What Influences IQ?
    • Genetics, early environment, parental education, exposure to lead, schooling, socioeconomic status—almost everything impacts IQ (11:26–12:36).
    • Manny highlights how online white nationalists misuse IQ research for eugenicist narratives (12:36).
  • The Flynn Effect:
    • “IQ scores have been increasing since post-industrial revolution… by 3 to 4.5 points per decade.” (13:21)
    • Possible causes: improved health, education, family structure, nutrition, media (14:01).
  • The Reverse Flynn Effect:
    • “The observed increases… had either started to stagnate… or decrease.” (15:51)
    • The decline can’t be simply explained by genetics, migration, or a single factor—it may have to do with society “switching what they care about.” (17:20)
  • Curious Exception – 3D Rotation:
    • “If I present you a cube… those scores were actually increasing… So… there was kind of a split.” (17:30)
    • Possibly due to more screen time and gaming from a young age (17:56–18:13).
  • Where Is This Going?
    • Elizabeth: “It’s going to be very dependent on what's valued and what's emphasized… we just don't have the data to know yet… there might be differential paths where folks already very disadvantaged might suffer more.” (18:47–19:55)
    • Could lead to a “K-shaped” pattern—some groups excel, others stagnate or decline.

Societal Impact of Fragmented Cognitive Trends

• Devin: “Just more of a divide between the people who do do and who don’t do.” (20:17)
• Noah: “That’s in that sense…it’s kind of a real return to…500 years ago… a bunch of peasants and then, like 10 guys who know things.” (20:57)

4. What Defines Generations?

Interview: Dr. Jean Twenge ("Generations") (22:03–34:55)

• Defining Cut-offs:
  • Generational borders are fuzzy, except for Baby Boomers (based on birth rate). The bright lines often correspond with major societal changes, especially the Millennial/Gen Z split (25:56–27:17).
  • “Between Gen X and Millennials… there’s not a clear, bright line… but Millennials and Gen Z, there really is.” – Jean (25:56–27:17)
• Technology as the Great Shaper:
  • It’s not just phones/computers—it’s also advances in medicine, transportation, labor-saving devices (28:04–30:07).
  • "Slow Life Strategy":
    • Because of longer lifespans and delayed milestones, every stage of life is stretched: “Kids are less independent… Adolescents are less likely to date or have a job… Middle aged people look and feel younger.” (29:58)
• Big Events:
  • The hosts (and Jean) point out how events (9/11, Great Recession) and new tech shape generational attitudes (30:25–31:13).

5. Generations and Individualism

• Individualism Across Generations:
  • Jean: “Cultural individualism explains an enormous amount of generational change… from the silent generation to the millennials.” (33:07)
  • Gen Z has “backed off some of that outsize overconfidence… especially in their youth.” (39:45)
  • A recent “return to conservatism” and reactionary trends (e.g., “tradwives,” manosphere), plus empirical evidence of declining enthusiasm for gender equality in some groups (34:55).

6. Millennials vs. Gen Z

• Pessimism, Empathy, and Technological Upbringing:
  • Gen Z: First to have smartphones throughout adolescence. Higher levels of depression and pessimism, spend less time with friends in-person (38:00–39:13).
  • Empathy on the Rise:
    • “Rates of empathy went down from Boomers to Gen Xers to Millennials, and then they went up with Gen Z.” (39:13)
    • Gen Z is more likely to want jobs directly helpful to others.
  • Political Engagement:
    • Gen Z participates more in collective/empathetic activism (e.g., DSA, socialist movements)—Manny: “That empathy… goes hand in hand with Gen Z being more politically engaged too.” (40:39–41:08)
  • Political Leanings Shaped by Timing:
    • “If you were young… during the presidency of a popular [party], that would tilt your political beliefs in that direction for life.” (35:59)
    • Notably, Gen Z might defy predictive trends because of the absence of popular leaders during formative years and deepening class divides.

7. The Pop Culture (and Media) Generation Wars

• Generational “Blame” in the Media:
  • The hosts joke about headlines blaming millennials and then Gen Z for “ruining” everything (42:17–42:46).
  • The youngest group is always in the cultural crosshairs.
• Why We Talk About This More Now:
  • Jean: “Because of social media and even comment sections on newspaper articles… there’s a democratization of the discussion of these things… people want to understand how their experience was different from others.” (42:53)

8. Wrapping Up – Synthesizing Lessons

• Generational categories are informative but inherently fuzzy and average-based; individual experience varies.
• Manny: Sees opportunity for mutual learning instead of adversarial stereotypes: “There are things we could teach each other… It's much less a Millennials vs. Gen Z in my head. More about, you know, how can we collaborate?” (45:00)
• Noah (playfully): “They're trying to separate us. Who's they? The Baby Boomers.” (45:41)
• The group ends with a note of tongue-in-cheek unity, dismissing rigid generational “wars.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Manny (on Millennial experience):
  “We remember the old world, so to speak.” (03:52)
• Devin (satirizing generational superiority):
  “That's kind of why we're the greatest generation of all time. And it's all downhill.” (04:26)
• Elizabeth Dwarak (on IQ):
  "Your brain's a muscle… Part of it is nature. But like, how's it being nurtured?" (11:26–12:36)
• Jean Twenge (on why generations matter):
  “When you were born does absolutely have an impact on your life course, on your attitudes, on your behaviors, on your personality traits. We know that.” (25:56)
• Jean Twenge (on Gen Z empathy):
  “Rates of empathy went down from Boomers to Gen Xers to Millennials, and then they went up with Gen Z.” (39:13)
• Manny (on Millennial vs. Gen Z unity):
  “It's much less of a Millennials versus Gen Z in my head. More about, you know, how can we collaborate?” (45:00)
• Devin (on media narratives):
  “It's all millennials killing something.” (42:17)
• Noah (on the relativity of generational experience):
  “These are studies based on averages. There's always gonna be outliers…” (44:06)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 01:05 – Generations defined and “generation skepticism”
• 03:23–05:12 – Millennial as the bridge generation
• 08:52–19:54 – Interview with Elizabeth Dwarak: IQ, Flynn Effect, and intelligence trends
• 22:03–34:55 – Interview with Jean Twenge: Defining generations, impacts of technology/individualism
• 38:00–41:08 – Comparing millennials and Gen Z: depression, empathy, political engagement
• 42:17 – Media blaming generations for cultural woes
• 45:00 – Synthesis: collaboration instead of rivalry

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Tone & Style

• Conversational, irreverent, self-aware, and research-driven.
• The hosts balance humor with a willingness to challenge their own biases (“Let me not make so many generalizations.” – Manny, 03:53).
• Guests provide accessible but nuanced academic analysis.

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Final Thought

While the episode begins with the tongue-in-cheek question of whether millennials are “the elite generation,” it ultimately reveals the futility of pitting generations against each other. Intelligence and capability are shaped by evolving societal priorities, environmental factors, and technology. Though trends may ebb and flow, the real value may lie in intergenerational learning and resisting oversimplification.

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Transcript

[Manny Fadell]

Kaleidoscope. I'm Manny.

[Noah Friedman]

I'm Noah.

[Devin Joseph]

This is Devin.

[Noah Friedman]

And this is no Such Thing. The show where we settle our dumb arguments and yours by actually doing the research this week. Are the current generation of, say, 30 something year olds the peak of human intelligence and cognitive ability? We'll find out.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

I know there's no. No such thing. No such thing. No such thing. No such thing. No such thing.

[iHeart Podcast Advertiser]

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[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

All right, boys, today we're going to talk about generations and some recent research that shows IQ scores are declining. Now, someone could use that to back up an argument that millennials are the elite cohort. But first, let's back up and just name some generations.

[Noah Friedman]

What do we got?

[Manny Fadell]

You got the baby boomers.

[Devin Joseph]

Gen X. Gen X, Gen X. After them Millennials. We got Gen Z. Gen Z. Who's the new ones? Gen Alpha.

[Noah Friedman]

Alpha.

[Manny Fadell]

Alpha. And I think my daughter is Gen Gen Beta.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

Whoa.

[Devin Joseph]

I don't like that she's a beta.

[Manny Fadell]

Let me fact check.

[Noah Friedman]

I think they're.

[Devin Joseph]

Your daughter's a Beta.

[Noah Friedman]

I think, I think, I think it's. I think after that, it's a little up in the air still.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah, they don't know timelines.

[Noah Friedman]

Maybe we will get into how these are actually broken down.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah, there's always, I feel like a lot of conversations around, well, sometimes people identify with different generations than they are. And the first time Kanye said he was gonna run for president at like some VMAs or something, he said, we the millennials. I believe in myself. We the millennials, bro. This is a new. This is a new mentality. And I was like, hold on, I don't know how this works, but I'm pretty sure Kanye west is not a millennial.

[Manny Fadell]

He's older than a millennial.

[Noah Friedman]

He was born in 77. So, yeah, that's Gen X, I believe.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah, Gen X.

[Devin Joseph]

That's got to be Gen X.

[Noah Friedman]

But yeah, I mean, I've always been a little skeptical of the categorizations. I think, you know, certainly 15 years ago, it was always like, millennials are doing this. Millennials are like this. And it was like, okay, and now, now that we fully kind of moved on, where now it's all zoomers. Are doing this, zoomers are doing that. I'm like, all right, what's. What's really, like, you just mean what's the difference between just like, it's young people versus.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

Us. Or, you know.

[Manny Fadell]

Right.

[Noah Friedman]

In groups? Like, it seems like, well, we're just talking about people of a certain age in this time period versus, like, we're actually so different from one another.

[Manny Fadell]

And it's like, are there inherent qualities or characteristics between generations?

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

Or are we just talking about the current young people?

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

And maybe those are the same things. You know, let's start with our own group. Millennials.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

How would you describe the cohort?

[Manny Fadell]

I've always thought about it as. How do I word this? So Gen Z grew up with the Internet. It was already there, and so did we. But we have memories of when, like, the Internet wasn't ubiquitous.

[Devin Joseph]

The Internet grew up with us.

[Manny Fadell]

Exactly.

[Noah Friedman]

The Internet. Millennial.

[Manny Fadell]

And phones. Right. Like, we remember times when we didn't have phones. Gen Z doesn't pro. And so I kind of define us in that way where, like, we remember the old world, so to speak.

[Noah Friedman]

It's a key difference.

[Manny Fadell]

And so we're not. So we're not as reliant on, you know, the screens and the phones, and we. We know how to kind of socialize outside of. Well, maybe. Let me not make so many generalizations.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Okay.

[Manny Fadell]

That's.

[Noah Friedman]

This is what we're doing.

[Devin Joseph]

It's part of what we're doing.

[Noah Friedman]

You got to do this, and then you can correct the record.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

In 40 minutes.

[Manny Fadell]

I just feel like I see so much content, and maybe this is my own algorithm about Gen Z. People who are, like, afraid to, like, ask for the bathroom code at Starbucks or whatever, because they just didn't grow up talking to people.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

In the same way that we did.

[Devin Joseph]

And I feel like that's. That's kind of why we're the greatest generation of all time. And it's all downhill.

[Noah Friedman]

So here's why you think, yeah, millennials are the greatest generation.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

You know, not the greatest generation, as you know, discussed.

[Manny Fadell]

Is that another generation?

[Devin Joseph]

I think. Yeah. I think millennials, my biggest. You know, I haven't done any research on this at all, but in my head, I was like, we've come up during a perfect time where we were still incentivized to search and seek out that information. And it wasn't just given to us. Like, there was still work that had to go into that. So I feel like at this point. And it's no fault of all the coming generations. I'm not saying that we are, you know, inherently better.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

Inherently smarter or I just feel like, yeah, we grew up in a society where knowledge was valued to some degree. The searching of that knowledge, that process, and I think the future generations, that knowledge is not as prioritized. It's a lot easier to get answers to things. I feel like we're just moving and everyone is moving in this direction. We are moving in this direction. Our parents, our grandparents are moving in this direction. But I think the newer generations, because they are not gonna grow up in a world in which this was ever as, you know, these things were never as valued. They're never going to go through that process of having to learn these things. So inevitably you're just going to get dumber if you're never writing, you know, a 10 page paper, if you're never reading a full book, if you're never in a real way comprehending information. I think we're just slowly, from generation to generation gonna get a bit dumber now. Unless there's some sort of big backlash to technology and there's value to knowledge seeking. And it's a lot of stuff that we talked about in like the reading episode of why Kids Aren't Dumb.

[Manny Fadell]

And by dumber do you mean kind of like less equipped to do research and that kind of stuff?

[Devin Joseph]

I think problem solving, I think there's a lot of aspects, I think it's, I think our attention spans are gonna be, you know, everyone's attention spans are getting worse. Younger generation is going to be even worse. I think they're going to be worse at problem solving. I think critical thinking skills are going to get worse. I think just like, you know, maybe there'll be better athletes. You know, like we're getting so much more technology. Yeah, there's a lot more tech around. You know, the athletes of today are a lot more equipped than the athletes in the past. So maybe in terms of athletics they'll continue to get better, but everything else, they'll just get dumber.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah, we'll just be jocks.

[Devin Joseph]

So that's my argument for why we're the greatest generation and everything. And look, I think up until this point, every generation, every new generation was smarter than the generations past.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah. You're saying this is the turning point.

[Devin Joseph]

I think this is the turning point where we're gonna see a dip. And I don't see a world in which, at least in a short term that changes anytime soon.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah, I agree. I think we are the most equipped, most prepared Generation prepared for just life in general, Everything that life has to offer. I think we're. I don't know, we're more ready for that kind of stuff just based on how we grew up. And that's no fault of Gen Z at all.

[Noah Friedman]

You guys are scared.

[Devin Joseph]

We had. I think we have a lot of stupid, dumb, like, okay, chopped on.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah, yeah, they'll come for us.

[Devin Joseph]

I think we have a lot of, you know, dumb millennials who are unprepared for life, whatever, but they had all the tools available.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah, exactly.

[Devin Joseph]

That's. It's like you. You have no excuses now. If you're a millennial, and you are, you can't function.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

So I want to find out how generations are studied and what actually makes them different. But before we get into more specifics of generations writ large, there is a paper I wanted to discuss that touched on what you just brought up about people getting dumber.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

So there's a phenomenon called the Flynn Effect, which shows IQ scores increasing each decade. So each generation is getting a little

[Manny Fadell]

bit smarter by the iq, by the IQ test standard.

[Noah Friedman]

But new research shows that we may be witnessing a reversal with IQ scores declining for the first time. So I wanted to find out what that actually meant. Are millennials the smartest generation? So I called up the researcher who published the paper.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

Hi, I'm Elizabeth Dwarak. I am an assistant professor at Northwestern University. I study individual differences, cognitive ability, how to measure it, how it impacts your life and outcomes, everything. They call me a cradle to grave researcher. So some of my research is all the way down to kiddos that are only 15 days old and then over 100. So I kind of, kind of do it all.

[Noah Friedman]

So before we go any further, here's what IQ actually is.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

IQ is the conceptualized intelligence quotient, which is like a standardized way of measuring cognitive ability or intelligence. Some people say that it's literally just the test of everyday life.

[Noah Friedman]

How is it measured?

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

There are a lot of different types of IQ tests. They can be very domain specific or more broad or a mix of things. So this can be things like your verbal ability, your math ability. There are things called executive function. And that includes things like your ability to inhibit, your ability to pay attention, your processing speed. How quickly can I get this done? There's also aspects of memory. So there's episodic memory, associative memory, working memory. It depends how nitty gritty you want to go.

[Noah Friedman]

Elizabeth said it's often broken into fluid and crystallized intelligence. Crystallized being things you gain along the way through life. Like math and verbal skills, fluid is more like memory and processing speed. And then separately there's a spatial component, like if you can rotate shapes in your head.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

So if you're playing Legend of Zelda and you're trying to do one of those puzzles where you're rotating it, how well can you rotate it in your head and complete that puzzle?

[Manny Fadell]

Her example about Zelda is also really funny because, you know, I love the puzzles in Zelda and like, sometimes I get really stuck on them. And I remember growing up, I'm three years older than my younger brother, but when we were kids, I would always get stuck on a puzzle and give him the control to solve it. He's just smarter than at the puzzles.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

And I'll be just. I was so bewildered, like, what the hell? This, like, little ass kid is solving these puzzles and I can't.

[Noah Friedman]

He's a shape rotator.

[Manny Fadell]

He's probably got a higher iq.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah, he's able in his head to turn that, turn that puzzle around.

[Noah Friedman]

So what factors impact a person's iq?

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

So there's a lot that impacts it. What doesn't impact iq? Okay, part of it can be genetic. Part of it can be specifically not the genetic component, but the, like, my parents have this level of education, so therefore they have this access to wealth and therefore I have this access to a lifestyle. Like, there's very early components that your parents and your grandparents can have an influence on. There's also things going on in your own life. So it's like, what kind of school, what kind of early education, what kind of green spaces do you have? So there's things in your environment that can impact you. There's obviously, like, lead exposure is one that gets talked about a lot. I think, like, almost anything can impact, like, you're. You're a little sponge. And then like, as you go throughout life, it's again, like, what do you have access to? What are doing every day? I think the best way to describe it is that your brain, like, your brain's a muscle. So, like, part of it is nature. But, like, how's it being nurtured? What lifestyle things do you have? What kind of adversities are you facing?

[Manny Fadell]

Because that also plays into it the environmental factors. Part of it is interesting because my algorithm on X is so fucking cooked. It's a bunch of, like, white nationalists who use the IQ test as a, as a sign of inherent intellect that, like, they like, point at these populations around the world and they're like, look, White people are so much smarter. But of course, like most things, it's. You're a product of your environment. And that obviously is going to affect the IQ score.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah. So the answer is basically everything and anything. So now we can move on to the Flint effect, which is IQ's increasing generation by generation.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

The Flynn Effect is a phenomenon specifically named after Dr. James Flynn. And it's that IQ scores have been increasing since post industrial revolution. Around 1932 through the 20th century, he was estimating that increases were happening between 3 to 4.5 IQ points per decade. I just want to say that it's important to note that just because IQ scores were increasing, that doesn't actually everyone was suddenly getting smarter than their grandparents. It's just that the newer scores were higher than the older scores. There was a difference.

[Noah Friedman]

What are the factors that would contribute to that?

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

Things that could have been contributing to an increase in scores could be environmental things like better health, longer increased access to education, or just improved education in school systems. There are some theories that increases could have happened because of more access to like media or computers or things like that. There are also theories about smaller families so, like, there's more resources to put into kids. Improved nutrition with better health is one of them. There's also this idea that Flynn talks about a lot where it's the idea of like society just started valuing different things. There was just like a cultural shift to allow people to do things that might be occurring, like going to school or just leisurely activities of things that could be reinforcing and strengthening your abilities in specific areas.

[Noah Friedman]

So before we get to the reversal, that all kind of makes sense to me. Like. Yeah, just knowing what we know about the 20th century with, you know, people having more free time and better education and everything else. Yeah. People are just going to be able to have more intelligence.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

Like focus on those sorts of things versus being on the farm or whatever,

[Manny Fadell]

you know, increase the capacity for the iq, I think.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah, yeah. So I think when she. She kind of notes that, you know, it doesn't mean people are smarter. It's the scores are getting better. I think that speaks to that.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

I think that's our whole argument, period, is that the younger generations are not necessarily dumber.

[Noah Friedman]

Right.

[Manny Fadell]

It's just like it's the. How well equipped are you?

[Noah Friedman]

So now that leads us to the reverse Flynn effect.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

The reverse Flynn effect is something that was discovered in the early 2000s, is when the first article came out. The observed increases that we had seen in cognitive ability had either Started to stagnate. So kind of flatten out or decrease. I just talked about like all the things that increase it. Like we have to think about those too when we're talking about decreasing. Is nutrition getting worse? Has education changed? Whether that is like a focus of different things within the education system where they're no longer reinforcing these things we had seen increases in or if it's actual changes in education systems, test taking behavior. There was a bigger push in the literature that like some of this stuff might be due to things like migration. Things that get really, I'm gonna call it yucky eugenist area territory. And there's really great papers doing within family research that actually shows like no, it happens within families too. Like it's not, it's not like some kind of genetic component. There's a lot of people that like to point to like TV and media as well as like a possible decrease. It could just be that society is like switching what they care about or what they're interested in.

[Noah Friedman]

So that's kind of the rundown on Dorvis Flint effect. And despite the declines in most categories, one domain actually did increase.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

The most interesting thing to me is that 3D rotation. If I present you a cube and I ask you like what's the pattern? If you rotated this cube, those scores were actually increasing in our sample. So rather than seeing everything going up or going down, we actually saw that there was kind of a split in terms of how folks were performing.

[Noah Friedman]

3D rotation scores are the one one area that saw an increase while everything else is decreasing.

[Manny Fadell]

Is that because of gaming?

[Noah Friedman]

We don't know. But that was, you know, it's because us saying it. But yeah. My guess is probably screens in general and gaming. It's like understanding that viewing more things like that versus reading, you know, words you're gonna get better at and you're

[Manny Fadell]

sort of thing from such a young age, like me as nephew, like at one point didn't understand that when Mia would FaceTime him that she wasn't in the room. But now or you know, a few months later understood, oh, if Mia's in this little box, she's not in the room with us.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah. To cap things off with Elizabeth, I just asked like where she sees this going forward. Like are we just gonna continue on this route or is there anything that could turn this around barring like a, you know, kind of Dune style. But Larry and Jihad where they get rid of all computers.

[Elizabeth Dwarak]

I think that there's like a really a need to look at the domain Stuff because I help teases out like the why in terms of my study, I can't say nutrition's doing it because why would 3D go up and the other stuff go down or be stagnant? Like that doesn't make sense in terms of like a whole body thing. I think it's going to be very dependent on kind of what's valued and what's emphasized. What things are being chosen to cognitively offload. Like how much do changes in like verbal ability and literacy. Like has spelling ability gone down? Because we all have spell checks so now we don't need to worry about how well we spell. Obviously there's like bigger things that folks are concerned about. And the answer is we just don't have the data to know yet. I mean it might also vary because especially in the United States we're also seeing such economic disruption. There might be like differential paths as well that might occur where it's potential that like folks that are already very disadvantaged might suffer more and then folks that are very advantaged might benefit more.

[Noah Friedman]

So basically she's thinking it might be kind of a K shaped sort of thing where it's like. Which I've heard other people echo as far as reading or other things. Where it's like the people that really care about reading books or something. It'll just be more of a niche or movies or whatever. It's like it's just more of a niche world and then the masses are just gonna not. Not do that.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah, Just more of a divide between the people who do do and who don't do.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

People who read, who don't read, the people who care about things and don't care about things. And you'll be able to get by in a world where it's so deprioritized that it's not. It becomes like you're saying more of like watching like movies is not a requirement.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

People don't force people to watch movies for the most part.

[Noah Friedman]

And there's. Yeah, there's. There's things like that relatively harmless obviously. But then obviously there's like a big. Educationally that could be pretty bad if. Then it's like are. There's basically 0.1% of people who have really gone to school and know everything. And then you know, the plebes.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

Who are.

[Noah Friedman]

You know, it's like a. That's in that. In that sense it's like kind of a real return to like maybe 500 years ago. You know what I mean? Where it's like yeah, it's like a bunch of peasants and then like 10 guys who know no things.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

We're gonna take a break. When we get back, we're going to talk to an expert on generations to really break down what the generations are and what the differences are, if there are any.

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[Noah Friedman]

We're having a generational conversation. So I spoke to an expert on generations.

[Gene Twange]

My name is Gene Twange. I am the author of the book Generations and a professor of psychology at San Diego State University.

[Noah Friedman]

So first up, I asked Dr. Chuangi to define the generation line just so we can jump off from there.

[Gene Twange]

The book starts with the silent generation. So that's those born 1925 to 1945. And so they were generally too young to fight in World War II. And their label of the silent generation is a pretty big misnomer because they changed a lot of things in the law and around equality. So two of their most famous members, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Martin Luther King Jr. Then we have the baby boomers, born 1946 to 1964, known for being the babies born during that huge uptick in birth rates after World War II. And because they're such a large generation, they've had an outsized impact on American culture and politics. And it's often thought they were the leaders of the civil rights movement and the feminist movement. That was actually the silence. But the boomers lived those changes. So the silence changed the laws and boomers changed hearts and minds just through the way that they lived their lives. So Generation X, born 1965-1979, and kind of known for being the anti boomers, but they're really not. They built on a lot of the changes that the boomers started, but had a little more cynicism thrown in, a little more taking some of those changes for granted, a lot more individualism and focus on the self in a more pure form than the way that boomers explored the self. Boomers explored the self in groups. Gen Xers were like why do you need the group? It's about the self. Millennials, born 1980 to 1994, experience that height of the increase in individualism in American culture. So a lot of emphasis on optimism, on feeling good about yourself, on self confidence. They were very wanted children, so experienced a lot of American prosperity until they didn't. Then they got hit by the Great Recession. So they had fair amount of whiplash. Gen Z born 1995 to nobody knows. But there's a consensus forming around 2009 being the last year for gen Z and 2010 being the first birth year for Gen Alpha.

[Noah Friedman]

I think one thing that. And I've seen this too, and even just like with our Kanye conversation is kind of the. When talking about generation, it's easy to think of these hard cutoffs. But yeah, there's obviously overlap for what the generation right before you did is going to be. Those are going to be influential people over you.

[Manny Fadell]

Exactly. Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

Even if it's just like, well, Kanye is someone that we all grew up listening to. He's not in our generation, but to us, he's like a very important artist. You know what I mean? And everyone's going to have that in any domain, whether it's politics or just music or art or whatever.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah. Often the people who are influencing you are not people from your generation.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

But they are people that your generation is growing up idolizing or, you know, influenced by. So it makes sense that therefore your generation would in some way mirror a slightly older generation.

[Noah Friedman]

My next question is how. How those divisions are informed as far as when they're looking at all the data and kind of trying to pick out.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

How are they grouping?

[Noah Friedman]

When is the generation ending or a

[Gene Twange]

new one Starting when you were born does absolutely have an impact on your life course, on your attitudes, on your behaviors, on your personality traits. We know that. What is more debated is how do we figure out what the cut points are for the different generations? And it's good reason that that's debated because those are somewhat arbitrary. Maybe the only exception is demographers are pretty set on baby boomers being born between 1946 and 1964 because that was the peak of the birth rate. It's right there in the generation name. Outside of that, usually just consensus develops around what the cutoff is for any particular generation. I think that line between Gen X and Millennials is particularly fuz. I've seen people place it anywhere from 1978 to 1982, and I can make arguments for any of those because there's not A clear, bright line between those two generations, Millennials and Gen Z. There really is. The data run in the early 2010s is a huge breaking point. From optimism to pessimism, from tech is connecting to tech is disconnecting from smartphones being something that you got as an adult, being something you got as an adolescent. So there's. That's a brighter line.

[Manny Fadell]

I was really fascinated by the. The aspect of whether technology feels like it's a connecting thing or a disconnecting thing. The difference between Millennials and Gen Z. When like Zanga and MySpace were coming out and we were like, holy shit, like, we can connect with our friends online versus today, where like, technology just seems so bleak that it will keep you on your phone instead of, yeah, you know, back. I feel like when we were kids. Yeah, it's flipped.

[Noah Friedman]

It really is flipped.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

Like the MySpace or whatever was a replacement for seeing your friends in real life. Whereas I feel like now the main thing is connecting on social media and then sometimes you get to see your friends in real life. I don't know.

[Noah Friedman]

To zoom out a bit more, I asked what sort of data she's looking at to make these sorts of definitions. And here's her main theory on this.

[Gene Twange]

The classic theory of generations is generations happen because there's big events, there's economic depressions and recessions, there's wars, there's pandemics, and how old you are when those events happen shape your worldview. So that's kind of the classical theory of generations. But if you really think about why it is different to grow up now compared to growing up in the mid 20th century, the answer to that, maybe a little bit events, but most of it is technology. That's what's really had the biggest impact in how people live their lives. So not just the technologies people use, but the downstream effects of those technologies. And when I say technology, I want to be clear. I'm talking about not just smartphones and computers and the Internet, but faster transportation, labor saving devices, better medical care. Those are things that have had an enormous impact on how we live. And they do have these downstream effects. So in the book, I talk about three major influences. The direct effects of technology, the increase in cultural individualism, and then the impact of something that's called the slow life strategy. So when you have better medical care and people live longer and education takes longer to finish in a technologically complex society, people have more years. They have more years to grow up. They take longer to grow up and longer to grow old. So that's the slow life strategy. It starts early. Kids are less independent. Adolescents are less likely to date or have a job or drink alcohol. Young adults get married later and have kids later than they used to. Middle aged people look and feel younger than their parents or grandparents did at the same age. Older people enjoy more years of health and more years of life. So you see at every stage of the life cycle that the trajectory has slowed down.

[Noah Friedman]

So she broke it down to technology. Cultural individualism increasing and the slow life strategy with technology kind of being the biggest one of those and then the others following that.

[Devin Joseph]

I think that makes a lot of sense.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

Because like she said, we think about technology as phones, computers. We don't think about trains, cars, and all the medical. Yes.

[Manny Fadell]

Waymos.

[Devin Joseph]

Waymos. No one's talking about Waymos. In terms of this generational conversation for,

[Noah Friedman]

say, our, Our generation, what would you say are the biggest things?

[Devin Joseph]

Big events.

[Noah Friedman]

Big events and technology.

[Devin Joseph]

Technology to smartphone for sure.

[Manny Fadell]

Definitely. I feel like 9 11, right?

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

Like how much security changed after that?

[Noah Friedman]

And I do think. I do think between us and Gen Z, who can't remember 9 11.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

It's huge.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah. Events. That's a huge event. Obviously.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah. I feel like trust in your neighbor or whatever that, that just fell so sharply after 9 11. I feel like. And then part of it, I think there's so much security. We, we discussed this in our TSA episode about security theater. But like the theater, it still does affect our lives where like, we feel less trusting of other people.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah. Ring cameras. You know, it's like, it's. It's surveillance.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Devin Joseph]

Us being surveilled and us surveilling each other.

[Noah Friedman]

Totally.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

And then you see the extreme of that with kind of the Gen Z. Like people always say Gen Z's so weird in public because they don't want to be filmed or doing something cringe.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

I don't know how true that is, but I think it's a piece of it. Of knowing any. If you mess up, it will be online in a way that we were certainly conscious of growing up, especially adapting to the new technology of like, don't give out information online or something. But yeah, that's big difference than like cameras recording you in public all the time.

[Manny Fadell]

If you spent your whole formative years scrolling a TikTok and seeing video after video of someone being embarrassed in public, that you might think, oh, well, I. I gotta.

[Noah Friedman]

Why risk?

[Manny Fadell]

Really? Yeah. Make sure I'm. I'm well behaved. Otherwise that could be me.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

And then that that also obviously feeds into the individualism idea in a lot of ways. But even just like on the kind of security tech aspect of like, well, I don't trust my neighbors. I'm like by myself, protecting my little palace with my ring camera, you know what I mean? And then plus also then social media and having to project yourself online on the kind of other side of that too. And then, yeah, on the individualism idea, this is not new. I read a New York magazine piece from 1976 by Tom Wolfe about the Me Decade. And it's like, you could probably take quotes of it and you would think it's applying to us or someone after us, or you were early king, but it's still on an upward trajectory. So it's one of those things where I wondered if this was a generation specific thing or is it just like a given increase? And the answer is it's both. And that doesn't mean it denies the existence of generations. It's just like we are more individualistic than generation before us, and they were before them. Yeah, like those ideas don't need to cancel each other out.

[Gene Twange]

When I first started doing this work, that was the theme that came up over and over was increasing individualism. So that meant more equality, it meant more positive views of the self. You know, it could go to extremes and mean more narcissism. You know, that showed up over and over. So say, I would say, pretty much unbroken from the silent generation to the millennials. Cultural individualism explains an enormous amount of generational change after that. I think it takes a little bit of a different flavor because Gen Z didn't have the part as much about feeling good about the self. A lot more pessimism, not as much self confidence, a lot more depression. But they certainly had individualism. You take equality, and that started with race, then it expanded to gender, then it expanded to sexual orientation, and then it expanded the transgender identity. And so you see that evolving over the course of the generations. And Gen Z definitely shows that they just don't show some of the other things about individualism. And whether that will keep going, I think is the question. I really think it is the question right now. Because there's a return to conservatism in a lot of ways. There's the dialogue online about tradwives and the manosphere. And we just recently in the last couple of years started to see some backsliding on even things like equal pay for equal work for women. Fewer young teen boys agree with that now than used to. And that's kind of shocking that you would see that. And maybe that'll come back. Maybe it'll be a blip of a few years. But I think that there's definitely, maybe a little more wobbling in this upward trajectory of individualism than there was even a few years ago.

[Noah Friedman]

You know, you always hear the trope of, you know, people are liberal when they're in their 20s and then they age, they get more assets or whatever and then become more conservative also. Just like culturally, it's like, well, the baby boomers, if they were pushing for all these things that were like liberal, progressive things, and now everyone's like, oh, boomers are so conservative, or they don't understand this. And that's just probably just like the path of history has to be like that. Like, there's going to be things probably in 50 years if we're alive that will be like, that's crazy.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah, yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

You know, and then people our age now would be like, oh, you're just old.

[Manny Fadell]

I always wonder what is the thing going to be? What's like a uncommon thing today that will become very common? Like, are people going to be marrying robots and. Yeah, but will that seem normal by then, is what I'm saying. Yeah, like we'll be the old heads that are like, out of touch.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah, yeah. You never had an AI boyfriend?

[Manny Fadell]

Wow, you old grandpa, get with the program.

[Devin Joseph]

I got 10 AI boyfriends. What are you talking about?

[Gene Twange]

There's a great paper from a few years ago that looked at generational differences in political beliefs and showed that if you were young, like adolescence or young adulthood during the presidency, a popular presidency of a certain party, that would tilt your political beliefs in that direction for life. So this is an explanation for why Gen X is more Republican and conservative than they should be otherwise. Because Ronald Reagan was a very popular Republican president. It's why millennials tilt more liberal and Democratic because of Barack Obama, Gen Z, we don't know. Nobody's been popular. It's just been a big old mess. So, you know, it's really kind of unclear which way their political leanings will go. But one of the reasons it's hard to parse is there's been a much bigger division by demographic factors than there ever used to be. So, for example, young men are now more conservative than they used to be. Young women are more liberal than they used to be 10 years ago. And it's not longitudinal, it's not following the same people. It's, you know, looking at, say, 25 year olds now versus 10 years ago that's what you see. And then there's also big divisions by socioeconomic status. So if you have a college education, you're now more likely to be a Democrat. That wasn't true 15 or 20 years ago. Even in high school, the students who expect to go to college are more likely to be liberal and Democrats versus those who do not expect to go to college. It starts that early. So you get that class division in the party line that didn't used to be there. Both age and generation are going to have an impact. Time period has an impact, too. I think the whole country has a more conservative feel now than it did even three years ago. So, you know, there are these effects that go across everybody. All three of those things are happening, especially with political attitudes.

[Noah Friedman]

Because I'm a narcissist, I asked for her to focus in on Millennials and Gen Z and compare and contrast the two just so we can kind of get some more answers on that.

[Gene Twange]

One of my definitions of Gen Z is that they were the first generation to spend their entire adolescence in the age of the smartphone, and that that has had big effects across many areas of their lives. It's one of the reasons why their levels of depression are so much higher than they were for Millennials at the same age. I think it's one of the reasons for their pessimism, because depression isn't just about emotions. It's about thinking. It's about cognition. It's about how you see the world and by definition, seeing the world in a more negative light. There's also that Gen Z spends less time with their friends in person. So particularly during adolescence and young adulthood, when Gen Xers and Millennials are getting together in person and hanging out in person and going to parties and driving around in cars and going to the mall with their friends, Gen Z at home, on their phone, communicating with their friends. That way, Gen Z's also growing up more slowly. That trend really got started with millennials, but just less likely to have their driver's license or go out on dates or have a job in high.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

School.

[Gene Twange]

One I think really big strength of Gen Z is their empathy. So rates of empathy went down from Boomers to Gen Xers to Millennials, and then they went up with Gen Z. Gen Z is more likely to say that they want a job that's directly helpful to others compared to Millennials and Gen Xers at the same age. So I think that that empathy and the desire to help others is a really big strength of Gen Z.

[Noah Friedman]

Do you have any guesses for why that shift happened, especially with the added pessimism.

[Gene Twange]

Yeah, and that's a little more of a mystery. So I think some of it is connected to some of these more individualistic personality traits. So another thing that shows that pattern is narcissistic personality traits increased from boomers to Gen Xers to Millennials, and then starting with late millennials went down. So when you have a less narcissistic point of view, you have more empathy for others. So I think that's partially where that came from. There's trade offs to optimism and pessimism. Right. There's some great things about optimism and feeling good about yourself, but there's also some big downsides to that. And so Gen Z kind of backed off some of that outsize overconfidence that Millennials had, especially in their youth.

[Manny Fadell]

I think in the empathy thing kind of goes hand in hand with Gen Z being more politically engaged too, where you see these, like, scores of Gen zers are now in DSA or like, you know, other socialist movements. And obviously one of the key kind of factors of that movement is like, caring for your neighbor. And so those things seem like they go hand in hand.

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[Manny Fadell]

I'm Manny.

[Devin Joseph]

I'm Noah Devin.

[Noah Friedman]

So we are talking about generations. We just heard from Dr. Jean Chwangy who laid out what the generations are, how they're studied and looked at and how they're generally thought about. But are people just talking about generations more than they used to be? Like, I was curious. Like, I feel like I certainly noticed it when we were millennials and everyone.

[Gene Twange]

Or.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

When we were kind of coming into becoming like proper adults.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

Adulting.

[Devin Joseph]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

Some other ones. Millennials are killing the dinner date. Millennials are ruining the workforce. Millennials are killing the beer industry. Are millennials killing credit? It's about. It's all millennials killing something.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah.

[Manny Fadell]

But here are some that sound like Gen Z. Why aren't millennials having as much sex? Yeah, that's exactly what they're Saying about Gen Z now, did millennials kill fashion? Have millennials officially ruined brunch? There's just like a billion of these.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah. The focus is always on the youngest group.

[Manny Fadell]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

So I asked if we're talking about generations, just more than we ever used to.

[Gene Twange]

I think there's always been a discussion of cultural generations. That's always been there. There was a lot of discussion of that when the baby boomers were young. They were such a large generation. They were so different from their parents. So, you know, it kind of goes. That discussion kind of goes in and out of style in a way. But I think now, because partially because of social media and even comment sections on newspaper articles and just there's a democratization of the discussion of these things, and people are fascinated by this. I certainly was. That's why I ended up doing research on it. And I love doing research on a topic that everybody wants to talk about, because people want to understand how their experience was different from others and if they have things in common with people their age, you know, who are born around the same time, versus people born 10 years before or 10 years after.

[Noah Friedman]

Yeah. So I think. And this goes to her technology thing of just like having social media, especially where you can log on to an app and you're talking to the world of all different ages, it's gonna impact that. Like, okay, now I can actually argue with some zoomer about whatever it is now how I want to spend my time. But I could.

[Manny Fadell]

I've done it, not above it.

[Noah Friedman]

And just another overall note on this is like, these are studies based on averages. So there's always gonna be outliers or people who don't feel aligned with everything.

[Devin Joseph]

Right.

[Noah Friedman]

But when you put everything together, this is what you get. So that's kind of just an overall note for how these. These are kind of looked at. So.

[Devin Joseph]

So don't email us.

[Gene Twange]

Yeah.

[Noah Friedman]

You know, everyone's going to have things where you relate more to a different group.

[Devin Joseph]

You're a millennial that hates Obama. Don't come for us.

[Noah Friedman]

Broadly speaking, we love Obama. All right, so I guess to wrap things up, I mean, how do you guys feel about this whole conversation? Has it made you more understanding of both the older and younger generations? How do you feel about your place in the trajectory of the gens?

[Manny Fadell]

It's a great question. I feel like, especially with millennials and Gen Z, that there are things we could teach each other that might be valuable. I think we could teach our show Gen Z. You know, why it helps to be optimistic about certain things. I think they could teach us why we should be more critical of certain things that are happening around the world. And so, you know, it's much less of a Millennials versus Gen Z in my head. More about, you know, how can we Millennials and. And Gen Z. Exactly.

[Noah Friedman]

The one thing they don't want.

[Manny Fadell]

You know, it's like they're trying to separate us on purpose. They're trying to distract us. Who's they? The. The baby boomers.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

Boomers

[Devin Joseph]

don't think about it that way.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

No, no, no, no. No such thing.

[Host/Moderator (Possibly Noah or Manny in a different role)]

All right. Just kidding, of course. No Such Thing stands proudly with our Boomer allies. No such thing as a production of Kaleidoscope content. Our executive producer is Mangesh Hatigidur. The show was created by Manny Fadell, Noah Friedman and Devin Joseph. Theme and credits song by Manny Mixing by our friend Steve Bone. Our guests this week were Elizabeth Jorak from Northwestern University and Jean Chuanghe, author of the book Generations. Subscribe to our newsletter at Nosuchthing show for updates. If you have feedback for us or a question, our email is mannynoadevonmail.com or you can leave us a voicemail by calling the number in our show notes. If you like the show, why don't you send it to a, you know, friend of yours from a different generation? Maybe this could be a good way to connect. Alright, thanks and we will be back next week with a new episode.

[Devin Joseph]

Bye.

[No Such Thing (Collective/Chorus or Producer Voice)]

No such thing.

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