Gen Z Woman Embarrassed By Her Generation’s ‘Weird, Stunted Social Skills’ — ‘We Have To Get Better At This’
kaanturker | Shutterstock Gen Z is known for a lot of things, like being great with technology and pushing for social change. Another thing that they’re probably not quite as thrilled to be recognized for is their lack of social skills.
Of course, social skills naturally vary from person to person, but some people are convinced that Gen Z faces a major deficit in this area. Surprisingly, this isn’t just coming from critics from other generations anymore. There are actually members of Gen Z who are speaking out and encouraging their generation to do better, showing just how widespread this problem has become.
One Gen Z woman said she noticed a lack of social skills in her generation while in college and is worried it will continue.
A content creator named Halina shared her thoughts on Gen Z’s lack of social skills in a TikTok video. “Gen Z has a really big problem when it comes to being standoffish, odd, and overall extremely rude in a lot of social interactions and social settings,” she argued.
To illustrate her point, Halina described a scenario that she often found herself facing when she was a student at Michigan State. She said that when she sat next to someone she didn’t know in class and tried to make small talk with them, they would “look around to see if, like, anyone was going to judge them for, like, having a social interaction.”
“Like, I’m not saying that everybody has to be best friends, OK?” she clarified. “Sometimes it’s just, like, a surface-level connection, and there’s nothing more than that … You don’t have to be [expletive] besties with everyone, but, like, interacting with each other is normal, and that’s not something that I see Gen Z do a lot.”
Part of the problem could be that Gen Z has a lot of social anxiety.
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According to a study conducted by Harmony Healthcare IT, more than one in two Gen Zers admitted to feeling anxious every day. Study participants identified their top five anxiety triggers as thinking about the future, money, work, socializing, and relationships.
Writing for the National Social Anxiety Center, Janeé Steele, PhD, A-CBT, pointed out that when they’re in social situations, “individuals with social anxiety tend to worry about behaving in ways that will cause them to be judged by others or embarrassed.” This sounds similar to what Halina noticed.
If someone has social anxiety, they’re going to have a difficult time socializing as easily as others might. That fear of judgment could hold them back from being their authentic selves and cause them to be a little more closed off. This could explain some of Gen Z’s problems with social activity, but there are other factors at play as well.
Gen Z’s social skills have also taken a hit because of their phone usage.
Sherry Turkle, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who has studied the impact technology has on people extensively, noted that constant social media use can lead to an inability to handle relationships and a tendency to “view other people in part as objects.”
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Additionally, the Harmony Healthcare IT study found that 37% of Gen Z think that their phone gets in the way of their activities, work, and relationships, while 57% “panic” when they have a low battery on their phone or they can’t access the internet. It would make sense, then, that a lot of Gen Z feel like they can’t be without or look away from their phones, which is causing antisocial behavior.
This is a major issue that has repercussions beyond just not developing healthy friendships. As Halina said, it’s “not going to be acceptable” to act that way in the workplace, which many members of Gen Z are now entering for the first time. The way someone socializes impacts almost every aspect of their lives, so it’s important for everyone, including Gen Z, to make sure they have a good handle on it.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
