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Why Do Young People Seem So Fragile? — Dr Jean Twenge (Modern Wisdom #623)

May 2023 🇺🇸 🇬🇧 Modern Wisdom (host Chris Williamson)

In this May 2023 interview, generational researcher Jean Twenge walks host Chris Williamson through survey data she argues shows Gen Z reporting far higher rates of anxiety and depression than prior generations at the same age, a trend she associates with the shift to algorithmically driven, smartphone-based social media around 2012 rather than any single cause. She contrasts the strength of this pattern against weaker associations for television or gaming time. Twenge also discusses delayed markers of independence among teens — fewer driver's licenses, later dating — and closes with two concrete recommendations: keeping phones out of bedrooms at night and enforcing a minimum social-media age of 16. TechKids Foundation includes this as a mainstream, general-audience presentation of Twenge's generational research distinct from her books and papers already catalogued under her own voice tag.

Roughly 60% of surveyed Gen Z girls reported experiencing a mental-health problem, per Twenge's account

Twenge cites this figure from her generational survey data during the conversation, discussing it alongside a documented rise in teen depression measures from 2011 to 2019 that she associates with the shift to smartphone-based social media around 2012.

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CITATION

Williamson, Chris, host. "Why Do Young People Seem So Fragile? – Dr Jean Twenge." Modern Wisdom, episode 623, May 4, 2023.

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