Have "Generations" become Research Zodiac Signs?

Lately, it seems like the use of generational labels as a prognostication device has reached a fever pitch. With social media influencers, journalists, and researchers alike searching for content and clicks, these labels have been used to make sweeping generalizations not just about what large groups of people are like but what they are going to do – now and in the future.

If you google “millennials are killing” you get nearly 7 million results. The things this generation has supposedly destroyed include: diamonds, mayonnaise, the guest room, maybe college, definitely marriage.

Not to be left out, apparently Gen Z is in on the murder spree taking out cursive writing, alcohol, concerts, also college, and middle management.

Gen Alpha is too young, their little hands still too weak to strangle an entire industry. 

The temptation here is clear – generational labels are self-contained, they have a nice science flavor to them, and they are a convenient package of dates and traits. Just like the signs of the Zodiac. But, I can only imagine how fast a research firm would be fired if they delivered a presentation to a client telling them that their product looks great for Aries and Leo, not so much for Taurus and Cancer. Yet findings that say Millennials feel this way, Gen Z wants that thing, or Gen Alpha will definitely do that are perfectly acceptable, desired even.

These observations aren’t particularly new nor are they apropos of nothing, but rooted in a generally flawed article I read recently titled The future of Work Depends on Understanding Gen Alpha now. Whatever its shortcomings, this portion stood out among the rest:

“We can also ask whether culture runs on predictable, recurring cycles. If so, can we use these to confidently predict fundamental traits of a demographic just by knowing what year they were born? According to Fourth Turning theory developed by Strauss and Howe, we can.”

As the notion of “generations” is being broadly reevaluated, this belief, though popular, is misguided and wrong. Pew recently commented on this approach to generational research calling it “content that’s often sold as research but is more like clickbait or marketing mythology.” It’s also a bit lazy. Particularly as this understanding of generations entirely overlooks fundamental aspects of individual identities - race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, socioeconomic status - and collapses them into a monolith that erases key distinctions.

The concept of a generation is useful when it centers on the shared experiences of people, particularly those events or changes of outsized significance: home internet, 9/11, the ubiquity of cell phones, the advent of social media, the Great Recession, a global pandemic. But culture isn't so neatly contained and those experiences aren't isolated to singular groups. Rather culture shapes and reshapes people's lives in a dynamic fashion.

And it doesn’t stop – there are plenty of millennials entering their 40’s whose attitudes and actions toward home ownership are still informed by the 2008 housing crisis. The cumulative effects of the Covid-19 pandemic are unknown, with some research suggesting that the impact of lock downs on education could be a drag on the global economy for the next 40 years.

Nevertheless, a generation isn’t a predictive tool, it isn’t all-encompassing, and probably shouldn’t be used as the sole signifier of how a person, or group of people, relates to the world. Instead, there needs to be a far greater emphasis on understanding the cultural and social context in which people live – that is the key to gaining valuable insights, but it isn’t as easy as sticking on a label.