Under the surface of Z, pulses are quiet without pulses, and this generation promised uncertainty every turn, but promised everything. From the world’s epidemic to economic instability to the digital saturated culture that never falls asleep, the Z generation is getting older in an environment that feels like a pressure cooker than a playground. And for many of them, it is damage.
According to a 2024 survey conducted by CARING Common Project of Harvard University, 58% of young people It has been reported to be struggling to find meaning or purpose in life between 18 and 25 years old. They are not overwhelmed, but they are not sure why they are doing everything. This is not simply a generation who wants a job, and wants their lives to be important. Nevertheless, the passage for the purpose seems to be blurred, blocked, or simply missing by many people.
Decades research The way people experienced happiness for the rest of their lives showed that it looked like a U -shaped curve. When I was young, I had a high happiness, so I dipped in middle age and tended to get up again as I got older. Recent surveys, however, showed that the curve began to reach flat.
Fantasy of digital intimacy
For many years, Gen Z has been dubbed as a “digital original” generation, a good and connected to technology and can be quickly adapted. But this continuous connection is expensive.
As the emphasis is marked luckAccording to a Harvard survey, high levels of social media use has been significantly low in life satisfaction. Platforms such as Instagram, Tiktok and Twitter are amplified by reflecting anxiety, which becomes a mirror and a magnifying glass. It is difficult to form an identity when constantly measuring the filtered version of all others.
I feel empty
According to Harvard studies, generation Z reports the lowest level of job satisfaction among all ages. This is not about laziness, but about breaks. They do not resist effort and resist meaningless things.
property The report emphasizes that many young workers are solved, motivated, and not supported. They want to contribute to something bigger than themselves, but they are trapped in a role that does not match their values or dreams.
Perhaps the most paradoxical insight? The most connected generation is also one of the most loneliness. Despite continuous online interactions, Gen Z reports that there is a strong and lack of direct relationships. According to the CARING COMMON REPORT production, a meaningful relationship with friends and family, especially offline, is a major predictor of mental health, but is often missing.
The epidemic has worsened the gap, but the problem is deeper. The relationship between romantic and Plato’s generation Z was gradually formed by digital platforms, leaving many isolation.
A generation looking for something
If you tell us something to us in the study, we are asking more deeper questions than today’s young people. “Why am I doing this?” “Who am I becoming?” “What is the point?” These are not a dramatic explosion, but a quiet echo of a generic craving.
As a senior researcher of Harvard Research, Richard Weissbourd luck“There is a gap between what young people feel and what they can express or understand.” The gap is a place where there is a crisis.
To meet this moment, the solution must go beyond the modification of the surface level. Mental health apps and corporate health emails are not enough. What generation Z needs is a cultural system that values humans about mentoring, space and productivity for honest dialogue.
