Generation Me--Revised and Updated

by Jean M. Twenge

  externals have weakened: S. A. Karabenick and T. K. Srull, “Effects of Personality and Situational Variation in Locus of Control on Cheating: Determinants of the ‘Congruence Effect,’ ” Journal of Personality 46 (1978): 72–95; and W. Mischel, R. Zeiss, and A. Zeiss, “An Internal-External Control Test for Young Children,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 29 (1974): 265–78.

  externals consistently achieve less: E. Cappella and R. S. Weinstein, “Turning Around Reading Achievement: Predictors of High School Students’ Academic Resilience,” Journal of Educational Psychology 93 (2001): 758–71; M. J. Findley and H. M. Cooper, “Locus of Control and Academic Achievement: A Literature Review,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 44 (1983): 419–27; and A. D. Kalechstein and S. Nowicki, “A Meta-analytic Examination of the Relationship between Control Expectancies and Academic Achievement: An 11-Yr Follow-Up to Findley and Cooper,” Genetic, Social, and General Psychology Monographs 123 (1997): 27–56.

  A definitive report concluded: J. S. Coleman et al., Equality of Educational Opportunity: Report from the Office of Education (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1966).

  “Our society has”: Julian Rotter, “External Control and Internal Control,” Psychology Today, June 1971, 59.

  6. Sex: Generation Prude Meets Generation Crude

  In Valerie Frankel’s novel: Valerie Frankel, The Not-So-Perfect Man (New York: Avon Trade, 2004).

  The Hookup Handbook notes that hookups: Andrea Lavinthal and Jessica Rozler, The Hookup Handbook (New York: Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2005), 2–3.

  A recent article in the Atlantic: Hanna Rosin, “Boys on the Side,” Atlantic, September 2012, http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/boys-on-the-side/309062/.

  “I think you can compare friends”: “The 411: Teens & Sex,” NBC, January 26, 2005.

  80% of people age 18 to 29: Pew Research on Social and Demographic Trends, “Barely Half of US Adults Are Married—a Record Low,” December 14, 2011, http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/12/14/barely-half-of-u-s-adults-are-married-a-record-low/.

  For her master’s thesis with me, Brooke Wells: B. E. Wells and J. M. Twenge, “Changes in Young People’s Sexual Behavior and Attitudes, 1943–1999: A Cross-Temporal Meta-analysis,” Review of General Psychology 9 (2005): 249–61.

  in 1970, the average woman: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 2012 and earlier years, http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab.html.

  An Oregon high school sophomore: CBS News. The Class of 2000 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001), ebook, 14–15.

  In a 2013 Gallup poll, twice as many: Joy Wilke and Lydia Saad, “Older Americans’ Moral Attitudes Changing,” Gallup Poll Report, June 3, 2013.

  The General Social Survey (GSS) asks: General Social Survey, analysis performed for this book.

  As recently as 2004: Ibid.

  Author Paula Kamen studied: Paula Kamen, Her Way: Young Women Remake the Sexual Revolution (New York: New York University Press, 2000), 225.

  A whopping 88%: Lawrence K. Altman, “Study Finds That Teenage Virginity Pledges Are Rarely Kept,” New York Times, March 10, 2004.

  participants in abstinence programs: American Psychological Association press release, “Based on the Research, Comprehensive Sex Education Is More Effective at Stopping the Spread of HIV Infection, Says APA Committee,” February 23, 2005, http://www.apa.org/releases/sexeducation.html or http://www.apa.org/releases/sexed_resolution.pdf.

  numerous newspaper stories: Laura Sessions Stepp, “Unsettling New Fad Alarms Parents: Middle School Oral Sex,” Washington Post, July 8, 1999; Anne Jarrell, “The Face of Teenage Sex Grows Younger,” New York Times, April 3, 2000; and Barbara Cooke, “When Is Sex Not Sex?,” Chicago Tribune, March 4, 2001.

  Many kids say that oral sex: Benoit Denizet-Lewis, “Friends, Friends with Benefits, and the Benefits of the Local Mall,” New York Times Magazine, May 30, 2004.

  In a mid-2000s NBC special: “The 411,” NBC.

  In the late 1960s, only 42%: Kamen, Her Way.

  In a 2010 study conducted: http://www.nationalsexstudy.indiana.edu/.

  in the Indiana University 2010 survey: Ibid.

  In Alfred Kinsey’s studies: Kamen, Her Way, 76.

  In 2010, members: Angelica Bonus, “Fraternity Pledges’ Chant Raises Concerns at Yale,” cnn.com, October 18, 2010, http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/10/18/connecticut.yale.frat.chant/.

  “When I was in porn”: Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs (New York: Atria Books, 2005).

  In her 2013 book, Masterminds and Wingmen: Rosalind Wiseman, “What Boys Want,” Time, December 2, 2013.

  In a 2013 Gallup poll, half: Wilke and Saad, “Older Americans’ Moral Attitudes Changing.”

  Three times as many women: “Cosmetic Surgery National Data Bank: Statistics 2012,” American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, http://www.surgery.org/sites/default/files/ASAPS-2012-Stats.pdf.

  in the New York Times Magazine article: Denizet-Lewis, “Friends, Friends with Benefits.”

  In an NBC/People poll, almost half: Michelle Tauber, Thomas Fields-Meyer, and Kyle Smith, “Young Teens and Sex,” People, January 31, 2005.

  A survey conducted between 2005: Kate Taylor, “Sex on Campus: She Can Play That Game, Too,” New York Times, July 12, 2013.

  Sociologist Elizabeth Armstrong observes: Rosin, “Boys on the Side.”

  Young authors Andrea Lavinthal: Lavinthal and Rozler, Hookup Handbook, 4.

  Features of the hookup: Ibid., 182.

  One woman says she knew: Ibid., 221.

  As The Hookup Handbook puts it: Ibid., 10.

  As The Hookup Handbook notes: Ibid., 232.

  Monica, 16, said: Today, NBC, January 27, 2005.

  This is art imitating life: Ibid.

  A study of almost 2,000 teens found: “Study Links TV to Teen Sexual Activity,” cnn.com, September 7, 2004; and R. L. Collins, “Sex on Television and Its Impact on American Youth: Background and Results from the RAND Television and Adolescent Sexuality Study,” Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 14 (2005): 371–85.

  young black women who watch: G. M. Wingood et al., “A Prospective Study of Exposure to Rap Music Videos and African American Female Adolescents’ Health,” American Journal of Public Health 93 (2003): 437–39.

  Thirteen-year-old Maya, interviewed: Tauber, Fields-Meyer, and Smith, “Young Teens and Sex.”

  Pediatrician Meg Meeker calls it: Today, NBC.

  Linda Perlstein, the author: Linda Perlstein, Not Much Just Chillin’: The Hidden Lives of Middle Schoolers (New York: Ballantine Books, 2003), 87.

  sexual terms and talk are: Marnie Huner, “The Secret Lives of Middle Schoolers,” cnn.com, November 19, 2003.

  In the New York Times Magazine article on hooking up: Denizet-Lewis, “Friends, Friends with Benefits.”

  A Kaiser Family Foundation study found that 70%: Richard Jerome, “The Cyberporn Generation,” People, April 26, 2004.

  “It’s a big ego boost”: Wiseman, “What Boys Want.”

  the rate of syphilis cases doubled: “Sexually Transmitted Disease Surveillance 2012,” Centers for Disease Control, Division of STD Prevention, January 2014, http://www.cdc.gov/std/stats12/Surv2012.pdf.

  one young man said he found out: Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, Emerging Adulthood (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 92.

  One study examined the sexual geography: Claudia Wallis, “A Snapshot of Teen Sex,” Time, February 7, 2005. I calculated the 61% figure myself from the figure in the article.

  A Kaiser Family Foundation study found that 75%: Melissa Alexander, “Television Programs Lack Safe Sex Message,” Daily Aztec (San Diego State University student newspaper), March 7, 2005.

  When watching TV, says college freshman Joyce Bryn: Ibid.

  11,295 people died of HIV: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 2012 and earlier years, http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab.html.

  Births to teens aged 15 to
19: Ibid.

  From 2006 to 2010, 48% of women: Karen Kaplan, “More Americans Are Living Together before Marriage, Study Finds,” Los Angeles Times, April 4, 2013.

  In a 2001 poll, 62%: David Popenoe and Barbara Defoe Whitehead, “The State of Our Unions: The Social Health of Marriage in America, 2001” (New Brunswick, NJ: National Marriage Project).

  Author Linda Perlstein saw a girl’s website: Perlstein, Not Much Just Chillin’.

  The authors of Midlife Crisis at 30 relate: Lia Macko and Kerry Rubin, Midlife Crisis at 30: How the Stakes Have Changed for a New Generation—and What to Do about It (New York: Plume Penguin, 2004), 92.

  As of 2010, 77% of US married couples: Kaplan, “More Americans Are Living Together.”

  7. The Equality Revolution: Minorities, Women, and Gays and Lesbians

  Reflecting on the events: “From the Front Lines of Freedom,” People, March 7, 2005.

  In 1970, just 5%: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 2012 and earlier years, http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab.html.

  In 1970, most blacks did not: Ibid.

  Charles, 27, interviewed: Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, Emerging Adulthood (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 129.

  Sixty-one percent of black: Ibid.

  Eighty-seven percent of high school students: Monitoring the Future Survey of high school seniors. Analyses performed for this book.

  among Americans born: New Strategist Editors. Generation X: Americans Born 1965 to 1976, 4th ed. (Ithaca, NY: New Strategist Publications, 2004), 221.

  In 1972, 32% still favored: General Social Survey. Analyses performed for this book.

  Back in the 1940s, psychologists: David Myers, Social Psychology, 4th ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993), 378; and Richard Severo, “Kenneth Clark, Who Fought Segregation, Dies,” New York Times, May 2, 2005.

  Jennifer Crocker and I gathered data: J. M. Twenge and J. Crocker, “Race and Self-Esteem: Meta-analyses Comparing Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and American Indians,” Psychological Bulletin 128 (2002): 371–408.

  For example, Asian American kids: Ibid.

  Women earn 57% of college degrees: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 2004 and earlier years, http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab.html.

  Most women in their 20s: Susan Mitchell, American Generations, 4th ed. (Ithaca, NY: New Strategist Publications, 2003), 334.

  in 2005—for the first time: Sam Roberts, “51% of Women Are Now Living without Spouse,” New York Times, January 16, 2007.

  More than six times as many women: CBSNews.com, August 7, 2012, http://www.cbsnews.com/media/common-myths-about-having-a-child-later-in-life/.

  As of 2009, only 18% of married couples: New Strategist Editors, Generation X, 144.

  Attitudes about women’s roles continued: J. M. Twenge, “Attitudes toward Women, 1970–1995: A Meta-analysis,” Psychology of Women Quarterly 21 (1997): 35–51.

  In 1984, for the first time: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 2004 and earlier years, http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab.html.

  Among high school students in 2012: K. Donnelly, J. M. Twenge, and N. T. Carter, “Change over Time in Americans’ Attitudes towards Women’s Work and Family Roles, 1976–2012” (unpublished manuscript, 2014).

  In the early 1970s, books used: J. M. Twenge, W. K. Campbell, and B. Gentile, “Male and Female Pronoun Use in US Books Reflects Women’s Status, 1900–2008,” Sex Roles 67 (2012): 488–93.

  In 2012, only 1 out of 1,000: American Freshman Study.

  Slightly more 2010–12 students: Donnelly, Twenge, and Carter, “Change over Time in Americans’ Attitudes Toward Women’s Work and Family Roles.”

  I gathered 103 samples: J. M. Twenge, “Changes in Masculine and Feminine Traits over Time: A Meta-analysis,” Sex Roles 36 (1997): 305–25.

  In 1989, 72% of college men: American Freshman Study.

  Studies have found that girls with working mothers: R. O. Hansson, M. E. Chemovetz, and W. H. Jones, “Maternal Employment and Androgyny,” Psychology of Women Quarterly 2 (1977): 76–78.

  In addition, nearly ten times: “Women’s Sports Foundation, Title IX: What Is It?,” womenssportsfoundation.org, http://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/en/home/advocate/title-ix-and-issues/what-is-title-ix/title-ix-myths-and-facts; and A. Guttman, Women’s Sports: A History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991).

  It’s likely that sports participation: J. E. Butcher, “Adolescent Girls’ Sex Role Development: Relationship with Sports Participation, Self-Esteem, and Age at Menarche,” Sex Roles 20 (1989): 575–93.

  Keith Campbell and I examined 446 studies: J. M. Twenge and W. K. Campbell, “Self-Esteem and Socioeconomic Status: A Meta-analytic Review,” Personality and Social Psychology Review 6 (2002): 59–71.

  In one of the essays, E. S. Maduro: E. S. Maduro, “Excuse Me While I Explode: My Mother, Myself, My Anger,” The Bitch in the House, ed. C. Hanauer (New York: HarperCollins, 2002), 8.

  Her mother, however, saw: Hanauer, Bitch in the House, 281–82.

  women used to rate themselves: American Freshman Survey.

  Married fathers spent three times: Tara Parker-Pope, “Surprisingly, Family Time Has Grown,” New York Times, April 5, 2010; and Kim Parker and Wendy Wang, “Modern Parenthood,” Pew Research on Social & Demographic Trends, March 14, 2013, http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/03/14/modern-parenthood-roles-of-moms-and-dads-converge-as-they-balance-work-and-family/.

  In a mid-2000s poll, 79% of young men: Michelle Orecklin, “Stress and the Superdad,” Time, August 23, 2004.

  As Susan Douglas and Meredith Michaels point out: Susan Douglas and Meredith Michaels, The Mommy Myth (New York: Free Press, 2004), 8.

  Writer Peggy Orenstein said: Lia Macko and Kerry Rubin, Midlife Crisis at 30: How the Stakes Have Changed for a New Generation—and What to Do about It (New York: Plume Penguin, 2004), 241.

  children who attend day-care centers: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Early Child Care Research Network and G. J. Duncan, “Modeling the Impacts of Child Care Quality on Children’s Preschool Cognitive Development,” Child Development 74 (2003): 1454–75; and P. Schuetze, A. Lewis, and D. DiMartino, “Relation between Time Spent in Daycare and Exploratory Behaviors in 9-Month-Old Infants,” Infant Behavior and Development 22 (1999): 267–76.

  Douglas and Michaels label: Douglas and Michaels, Mommy Myth, 5.

  Several studies have found that despite: L. C. Sayer, S. M. Bianchi, and J. P. Robinson, “Are Parents Investing Less in Children? Trends in Mothers’ and Fathers’ Time with Children,” American Journal of Sociology 110 (2004): 1–43.

  One People magazine cover story: Douglas and Michaels, Mommy Myth, 122.

  Peggy Orenstein describes the modern world: Peggy Orenstein, Flux: Women on Sex, Work, Love, Kids, and Life in a Half-Changed World (New York: Doubleday, 2000), 2.

  In Midlife Crisis at 30, Lia Macko and Kerry Rubin express: Macko and Rubin, Midlife Crisis at 30, 3.

  As Douglas and Michaels put it, “Both”: Douglas and Michaels, Mommy Myth, 12.

  As Orenstein puts it, young women have: Orenstein, Flux, 18.

  When you’ve always been taught: Judith Warner, Perfect Madness (New York: Riverhead Books, 2005), 9.

  Warner argues that many: Ibid.

  Young authors Macko and Rubin found the same thing: Macko and Rubin, Midlife Crisis at 30, 25.

  Douglas and Michaels sum up: Douglas and Michaels, Mommy Myth, 7.

  In less than two decades, those supporting: http://features.pewforum.org/same-sex-marriage-attitudes/.

  It asks if “a man who admits”: J. M. Twenge, N. T. Carter, and W. K. Campbell, “Changes in Tolerance for Controversial Beliefs and Lifestyles in the US, 1972–2012” (unpublished manuscript, 2014).

  “Kids are coming out”: Ibid., 117.

  In 2002, my University of Michigan graduate school friend: Betsy Cohen, “Community of Support: Hundreds Rally behind Family That Lost Home in Fire Friday Morni
ng,” Missoulian, February 10, 2002.

  8. Generation Me at Work

  When she arrived for the interview: P. Davidson, “Managers to Millennials: Job Interview No Time to Text,” USA Today, April 29, 2013, http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/04/28/college-grads-job-interviews/2113505/.

  “Human resource professionals say”: Ibid.

  Jonathan Singel, director of talent acquisition: Ibid.

  GenMe set to be 40%: L. Kwoh, “More Firms Bow to Generation Y’s Demands,” Wall Street Journal, August 22, 2012.

  we published the results of this analysis: J. M. Twenge, S. M. Campbell, B. R. Hoffman, and C. E. Lance, “Generational Differences in Work Values: Leisure and Extrinsic Values Increasing, Social and Intrinsic Values Decreasing,” Journal of Management 36 (2010): 1117–42.

  In October 2013, Goldman Sachs: M. J. Moore, “Goldman Pushes Junior Investment Bankers to Take Weekends Off,” Bloomberg Personal Finance, October 28, 2013.

  Chegg, Inc., an online textbook-rental company: Kwoh, “More Firms Bow.”

  In 1976, 3 out of 4: Twenge, Campbell, Hoffman, and Lance, “Generational Differences.”

  More in GenMe said it was important: Twenge, Campbell, Hoffman, and Lance, “Generational Differences in Work Values.”

  In one study, college career counselors named: L. M. Hite and K. S. McDonald, “Career Counseling for Millennials: Practictioner’s Perspectives,” in Managing the New Workforce: International Perspectives on the Millennial Generation, ed. S. T. Lyons, E. S. Ng, and L. Schweitzer (Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2012).

  Bill George, a professor: E. Kampinsky, “Millennial Males Seek Work-Life Balance Too,” Daily Beast, September 2, 2013.

  A study of Canadian young people: H. J. Krahn and N. L. Galambos, “Work Values and Beliefs of ‘Generation X’ and ‘Generation Y,’ ” Journal of Youth Studies, 2013.

  40% of 2012 GenMe students: J. M. Twenge and T. Kasser, “Generational Changes in Materialism and Work Centrality, 1976–2007: Associations with Temporal Changes in Societal Insecurity and Materialistic Role-Modeling,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 39 (2013): 883–97.