Wired world to be boon, bane for Generation Y: Survey

Published The Straits Times, 1 Mar 2012

WASHINGTON (REUTERS) - There is a good chance young people growing up in today's always-wired world will eventually become bright, nimble decision makers - if they don't wind up intellectual lightweights unable to concentrate long enough to chew over a good book.

So say 1,021 technology insiders, critics and students surveyed by the Pew Research Centre who were fairly evenly split about how always-on technology will impact the teenagers and twenty-somethings of 'Generation Y'.
In the survey, released on Wednesday, 55 per cent agreed with a statement that in 2020, the brains of young people would be 'wired' differently from those over 35, and that they would be able to find answers quickly.

Still, 42 per cent were pessimistic, agreeing with a second statement that in 2020, young technology users would be easily distracted, lack deep thinking skills and would thirst only for instant gratification.

The millennials or the always-connected generation - those born between 1981 and 2000 - would be at risk of making poor life decisions based on findings from a quick Google search or a text message response from a friend, those surveyed felt.

Many noted that humans are experiencing a revolutionary era - with new communication tools changing the knowledge landscape all the time - and said young people are approaching life and its tasks and challenges in new ways, with good and bad results.

'While they said access to people and information is intensely improved in the mobile Internet age, they added that they are already witnessing deficiencies in younger people's ability to focus their attention, be patient and think deeply,' said Ms Janna Anderson, an associate professor at North Carolina's Elon University and one of the study authors.

'Some expressed concerns that trends are leading to a future in which most people are shallow consumers of information.'

Pew and Elon University have been studying the millennials since 2006 and the survey's forecasts carry weight.

A similar poll taken in the early 1990s accurately predicted conflicts that would arise between online technology and copyrights, privacy and established institutions, Ms Anderson said.

Survey participants did offer strong, consistent predictions about the most desired life skills for young people in 2020. Among those they listed are:

Public problem-solving through cooperative work;

The ability to search effectively for information online and to be able to discern the quality and veracity of the information one finds, and then communicate these findings well (referred to as digital literacy);

Synthesising (being able to bring together details from many sources);

Being strategically future-minded; and

The ability to concentrate as well as distinguish between the 'noise' and important messages in the ever-growing sea of information.

'There is a palpable concern among these experts that new social and economic divisions will emerge as those who are motivated and well-schooled reap rewards that are not matched by those who fail to master new media and tech literacies,' said Mr Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Research Centre's Internet and American Life Project and a co-author of the study.

'They called for a reinvention of public education to teach those skills and help learners avoid some of the obvious pitfalls of a hyper-connected lifestyle.'

Many of those surveyed backed educational reforms to make distracted young people better able to handle always-on technology and to focus.

They included time-out zones, meditation, silence and going without Internet devices.

The Pew Research Centre's survey was carried out online from Aug 28 to Oct 31 last year, as part of Pew's ongoing project on the Internet and American life.

HYPER-CONNECTED GENERATION

MANY young people in the future will:

Grow up hyper-connected

Rely on the mobile Web heavily

Use the Internet as their external brains

Be adept at multitasking

Desire instant gratification 

Be satisfied with quick choices 

Lack patience

Have active brains 

Communicate findings well and have high digital literacy

Lightweight? Not them
Editorial, The Sunday Times, 11 Mar 2012

The survey released recently by the Pew Research Centre on how 'always-on' technology might impact the teenagers and 20somethings of Generation Y offers two readings. While 55 per per cent of 1,021 technology insiders, critic and students surveyed agreed that the brains of young people would be 'wired' differently from those over 35 and that they would be able to find answers quickly, 42 per cent were pessimistic. They believed that in 2020, young technology users would lack deep thinking skills, seek only instant gratification and be easily distracted. Dubbed as 'lightweight intellectuals', Gen Yers would be at risk of making poor life decisions if they rely on findings from a quick Google search or a text message from a friend.

But one should not overreact to the findings. It is a cliche that every generation thinks that younger people always come up short against the older set. They are too pampered, their memories are short, and they don't work hard enough. So goes the lament of the older folk. But every new generation has its own challenges. Generation Y, the survey respondents agreed, are undergoing a revolutionary change. For all we know, the new communication tools and the way the Gen Yers are using them might equip them sufficiently to navigate life's new pathways in the new revolutionised future.

When books were first printed for the mass market in Europe in the 15th century, priests and philosophers wrung their hands and warned that the human mind would become duller when memory could now be stored outside of the brain in books. But knowledge was revolutionised, and Europe was transformed. Western history changed its course. Old ways of reading and writing may well become less important by 2020, but communication tools now being used, and invented, may well still keep minds active and engaged.