Kids Raised In The 70s & 80s Developed 6 Emotional Habits That Most People Today Have To Learn In Therapy
Fortgens Photography | Shutterstock As a member of Gen Z, I've noticed that my generation tends to react to things differently than older generations. We tend to make decisions based on our feelings rather than fact and prioritize emotional well-being over productivity.
Maybe that's just part of being young, but I've noticed that when I talk to people who were raised in the 70s and 80s, it’s more than that. It seems like it's from life experience. Meanwhile, us Gen Z peeps have had to learn all this in therapy.
Kids raised in the 70s & 80s developed 6 emotional habits that people today only learn in therapy:
1. Independence
Although hyper-independence is not necessarily a healthy thing, autonomy is. Members of Gen X (born between 1965-1980) and millennials (1981-1996) have more emotional independence than Gen Z. According to the World Journal of Advanced Research, "Gen X’s emotional resilience is a critical asset, especially during periods of transformation.”
Gen z is not as independent as older generations. Generally speaking, Gen X and millennial parents have raised their kids to be more emotionally dependent, because they don’t want them to feel like they have to be independent at such a young age, like they did. Gen X is, after all, reported to be the most stressed generation, too.
2. Delayed gratification
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According to author Janine Ungvarsky, delayed gratification is “the ability to resist an immediate reward in favor of a more significant reward later on.” This is a skill that kids raised in the 70s and 80s learned from a very early age. Since their parents were part of the boomer or silent generations, their parents lived through wars, sometimes with significant sacrifices.
As a result, they passed on the skills of working hard in order to get what you want, knowing it won't come easily.
Gen Z and Gen Alpha seem to have difficulties with delayed gratification. Since we live in a world where we can communicate with each other at any given moment, we are not used to having to wait to receive something. This can be difficult later in life, especially in the professional world, when we need to know that hard work pays off.
3. Emotional regulation
Once again, most emotional habits that the kids raised in the 70s and 80s have are typically passed down from their parents. Boomers typically demonstrate emotional regulation, according to the aforementioned World Journal of Advanced Research paper. This means they are not quick to react and they take their time to think through decisions, or at least the appear to.
Kids and young adults today were not raised to do this. Instead, we have been raised to say what’s on our mind, which is often a good thing. We were raised to express feelings so we don't repress them, like older generations did. This approach, however, can sometimes backfire. Reacting too quickly can lead to poor decisions being made. Some of us have had to learn how to regulate our emotions in therapy.
4. How to be bored
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There were no iPad kids in the 70s and 80. Instead, kids would spend long stretches without structured entertainment. Yes, it was sometimes boring for these Gen X kids, but they also benefitted greatly from entertaining themselves with whatever they had around.
Child psychologists at the Child Mind Institute stress the importance of letting your kids be bored and recommend leave them to play alone without a screen for a chunk of time (while appropriately supervised for safety, of course!). Boredom often led to imagination, problem-solving, creativity, or simply sitting with uncomfortable feelings.
Therapy often helps people reduce the impulse to constantly distract themselves, but many of us Gen Zers wish we'd learned this skill more organically, like our parents did.
5. Rejection
In a 2012 study, researchers found that adolescents with higher rejection sensitivity had the greatest difficulty regulating negative emotions from social situations. The issue is that children these days are not being taught how to handle rejection or deal with criticism. They are often victims of what some are calling "forced inclusion".
While everyone can agree that bullying and other cruel social exclusion is better off gone forever, there are skills kids learn from being told "no" or losing a game. In fact, there is even a trend on TikTok where young adults practice being rejected. It’s an important skill to have for all areas of life, and kids these days often find themselves needing to learn it later in life than previous generations.
6. Saying 'sorry' in person
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Younger people have learned how to communicate via texting or social media, and not face-to-face. As a result, learning how to say sorry and repair relationships in person is a skill that most young people lack.
Along with this challenge, they find themselves struggling to tell their friend that their feelings are hurt while they are together in person. Often, they will wait until they're home so they can craft the “perfect” text. Often, they think this will help their friend (and themselves) be more comfortable with the process, but it can also lead to misunderstandings and needless hurt feelings.
MIT social scientist Sherry Turkle reports that the increasing phone obsession comes at the price of empathy and solitude, which is one big reason Gen Z kids and adults are now seeking therapy to learn yet another skill people raised in the 70s and 80s learned through life experience.
Sophie Bagheri is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and theatre who covers lifestyle topics.
