Getting Ahead

This chapter assesses how the pervasive influence of the adolescent character provides insight into the workings of another sector of modern life relevant to us all: the economy. Less of a collective undertaking than politics, economic activity is guided primarily by individual decisions and actions in the free market system; so many of the relevant effects are seen first and foremost at the individual level. But these individual effects can multiply and cascade to generate patterns that do have important consequences for the general economic and social fabric. Emotions, misperceptions, intangible costs and benefits, influenced in many instances by underlying character traits, lead people to act in ways that the traditional models do not anticipate. As in other fields, it is only recently that some researchers have started to link personality to economic behavior in interesting and enlightening ways to dig deeper into what makes people tick when it comes to economic decision making and activity. When we combine some of these findings with ideas about the changing contours of character in the adolescent society, we can develop new understandings of some of the more salient economic trends of the past number of years.

Problems of the Present

This chapter explains that what it means to be a normal adult has changed down the years as a result of normal adolescent qualities slowly migrating upward into adulthood. These changes in basic character traits and their diverse consequences certainly have not gone unnoticed — they just have not typically been identified as reflections of the adolescent nature of today's society. There is no shortage of references in current social commentary to problems that have crept up on us over time and which appear to stem from the gradual erosion of traditional norms and practices of adulthood. Among the most commonly cited trends: we do not participate in politics or civic affairs the way we used to; we have become overly materialistic, hedonistic, and detached from the more meaningful aspects of our lives; our shared cultural life has been hollowed out and dumbed down; and civility in personal relations and the public sphere has fallen by the wayside. Such laments are sometimes countered, rightly so, by noting that we have also left behind much of the rigidity and dogmatic thinking that characterized the adult world of the past. The adolescent society perspective casts these diverse trends in a new light by linking them to a common source of social change.

Adolescent Society, Then and Now

This introductory chapter discusses how nowadays, individuals aged twenty to eighty seem little concerned about adhering to traditional adult norms, favoring instead the free and easy ways of youth. In some cases, this may reflect a deliberate effort to adopt a youthful frame of mind in an attempt to stave off the inescapable reality of growing older. But often an adolescent way of thinking and acting seems to come very naturally to people. Instead of consciously seeking to recapture their youth, they are simply doing and expressing what feels instinctively right, reflecting the fact that in some important sense they have never really fully grown up. Examples of adults acting like adolescents support the conclusion that a youthful spirit now holds considerable sway and has reshaped important elements of modern adulthood. One way to gain insight into these changes is to look closely at teenagers themselves and their shared social setting.

Finding Balance

This concluding chapter highlights ideas which are largely aimed at finding a renewed place for adult attributes in today's society — a goal that is admittedly hard to pin down. For we have changed a great deal over the course of the past one hundred years, to the point that the defining qualities of adulthood have become more ambiguous and contested. So perhaps the first step, and in many ways the most challenging one, is to initiate a conversation, a serious and wide-ranging conversation, about what it actually means to be an adult in this day and age. If we are to provide guidance for young people moving toward that stage of life, we have to decide what we see as the basic prerequisites of adulthood at this juncture in our social evolution. This will not be a simple reversion to some archetype of the past, but it will likely involve some rekindling of venerable adult qualities updated for modern times. Yet these must be successfully combined with the liberating attitude and philosophy that our adolescent selves have rightly insisted upon. In the final analysis, adolescent and adult qualities must both have their place, as we search for a healthy equilibrium that can bring out the best in all of us.

Bucking The Trend

This chapter describes how the evolution of the adolescent society is not a simple one-way street where adolescent qualities become ever more prevalent and influential in the adult population over time. More than a decade into the new millennium there are important counter-trends, evident for some time now, that cry out for some acknowledgment and explanation. These developments are embodied in the attitudes and values of today's younger generation, a group that has been given various labels, most commonly “generation Y” or the “millennials.” A number of observers have suggested there is something quite different about today's young adults and teenagers. These new cohorts are bucking trends — undesirable trends for the most part — that had been moving steadily in the wrong direction for a great many years. The chapter contends that the “millennials” are those coming of age after the adolescent society was in full flight — roughly, those born from the late 1960s onward, the decade when adolescent norms and traits became fully manifest. In other words, millennial qualities have emerged gradually rather than abruptly, and paradoxically from within the very citadel of the adolescent society.

The Character of Adolescents

This chapter examines the character of adolescents. It is hard to say precisely how much the distinctive character of adolescents reflects a natural stage in the human maturation process and how much is the result of the intensive interaction with other teens that has become the norm in modern times. The safest bet is that it is a bit of both. With that framework in mind, the chapter first considers the distinctive qualities of teenagers that can reasonably be connected to the natural trajectory of human development, viewing this from a number of complementary vantage points. It then turns to the social setting of adolescence, where, as research psychologist Robert Epstein rightly points out, these teenage qualities have been given the opportunity to flourish and take root as never before.

Adolescence Alone?

This chapter addresses some key forces reshaping society over the past century (or more) that have combined with the rise of adolescent character traits in interesting and often unexpected ways to produce the adolescent society we see all around us today. The critical development was the articulation and dissemination of a philosophy that rejects entrenched privilege and tradition in favor of individual freedom. Personal autonomy and freedom of choice for all — or more simply liberalism, in the classical sense of the term — became the defining principles of the modern age. Other leading thinkers seeking to understand the state of today's society focus less on abstract philosophical ideals and more on the material realities that shape our lives. One prominent perspective holds that the main force of change is capitalism, now the dominant economic system in most parts of the world. In thinking about other factors that can help us better understand the evolution of the adolescent society, there is one that deserves special extended attention: the dramatic expansion in educational opportunities for people of all backgrounds. One trend that has puzzled many observers is the long-term decline in political engagement even as education levels have risen steadily over time.

A Century of Change

This chapter evaluates how it was in the early years of the twentieth century, as adolescence emerged as a defined life stage marked by intensive peer interaction, that adolescent qualities started to overflow the boundaries of adolescence proper, seeping upward into the adult world. Demonstrating the rise of the adolescent character over this long stretch of time involves various methods and sources of information. For the earlier years, systematic studies of personality and character traits were uncommon; evidence of the growing salience of adolescent attributes must rest primarily on a blend of historical and anecdotal evidence along with hints of emergent trends from scattered polling results. After the war, social science research flourished, and systematic, large-scale studies became more common, providing the foundation for more rigorous trend analysis. This mixed bag of evidence points to a steady rise of adolescent qualities over the decades, incubating first in the intimate circles of the adolescent realm and gradually moving outward and upward to find a home in society at large.

Liberating Effects

This chapter focuses on the considerable liberating effects associated with the rise of adolescent traits and values. The brash and bold manner of the current age reflects a more general loosening of social rules that has come with substantial benefits as well as costs. If some constraints of the past served a useful purpose, others were unduly restrictive. The prevailing philosophy these days is that we should be free to do just as we please if it does no direct and evident harm to others. These must be acknowledged as one of the principal benefits of living in today's adolescent society. At the same time, there are areas of modern life where we can reasonably ask if these liberating effects have gone too far and whether our newfound freedoms might be put to better use if more closely harnessed to adult goals and sensibilities. The chapter considers both the upside and the downside of the expansion of personal freedoms that is one of the hallmark features of the adolescent society.

Governing Together

This chapter contends that if we face challenges nowadays working together as a society of reasoning adults, the problem is nowhere more apparent than in the political arena. Politics matters — or should matter — a great deal. Elected officials make weighty decisions on a regular basis: how much tax to collect, where to spend public funds, what areas of our lives to regulate and control, all the while debating and determining the appropriate balance to be struck between overarching values such as freedom, equality, and security. One way or another, these decisions affect each and every one of us, making politics one of the few areas of modern life that can truly be considered a common societal undertaking. In theory, we should all be attuned to what is happening in the world of politics and seek to contribute to the process where we can. Yet there are numerous problems with how the system works in practice and a strong sense of detachment felt by many. The adolescent character of both politicians and citizens, the chapter argues, is largely to blame.