Baffled Mom Doesn't Understand Why Her Millennial & Gen Z Kids Can't Sit Down To Watch A Show Without Subtitles On
Lysenko Andrii | Shutterstock There are a lot of things older generations don't quite get about younger generations. One of those things is the younger millennials and older Gen Zers' love of having subtitles on when they're watching any kind of show or movie.
It was a point of contention raised by a mom named Kelly Gibson, who admitted she was initially confused by her adult daughters' love of captions. Now, Gibson is praising the practice, saying these younger generations have cracked the code for effectively watching TV and getting the most out of their favorite shows.
Mom doesn't understand why her millennial & Gen Z kids can't sit down to watch a show without subtitles on.
"Things you learn when your adult daughters come home for the holidays. So we went to watch a movie the other night, and we turned it on. I have three daughters and two of them are young millennials, the other one's an older Gen Z. All of them were like, 'Why don't you have the captions on?'"
Gibson, who is Gen X, found it odd that her daughters were adamant about having the captions on and even made a joke that she wasn't 70 yet, so she didn't need them. However, Gibson was shocked to discover that young millennials and older Gen Zers actually prefer to watch shows and movies with captions on.
"These young people have decided it's absolutely okay to watch movies with the captions going the whole time that they get more out of it," Gibson learned. "If somebody talks to them in the middle of the film, they can still read and get what's going on."
Most young people prefer subtitles to watching without them.
In a survey conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, people under age 45 are more likely to use subtitles than older adults. The poll found that about 4 in 10 adults under 45 use subtitles at least "often" when watching TV or movies, compared with about 3 in 10 adults older than 45.
Those 60 and older are especially likely to say they "never" use subtitles. Many young adults who use subtitles say it's because they are watching in noisy environments, whereas older adults choose them to better hear or understand what is being said.
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"Part of it is cultural," explained David Barber, a sound editor and mixer. "What the younger kids are doing is, a lot of them will multitask. They’ll listen to music while they’re watching a show. So they’re catching bits and pieces of this, bits and pieces of that. I think they probably are half-listening and half-watching. It’s an interesting phenomenon."
Gibson praised young adults for being smarter than older generations.
Vitaly Gariev | Pexels
She found it fascinating that young people were using subtitles and even admitted it's probably a smarter decision than older adults make. She even asked viewers of her video if that was something they do as well.
The caption thing might not be as shocking when you consider that most media consumed by younger adults is on social media. Nearly all of those videos have captions. It's become a natural part of how they absorb what they're viewing.
“A cultural shift is taking place where a lot of young people’s worlds are text-based nowadays,” Dr. Daria J Kuss, author of "Internet Addiction" and associate professor in psychology at Nottingham Trent University, told Stylist. “Consider asynchronous communication via smartphones and social media – reading and texting is an activity that often accompanies other activities and has become normalised. Subtitles have become part of this caption trend.”
In the comments section, many people agreed that they can't watch something without subtitles. And that it's more distracting to have them off than it is to have them on. Judging by how many people use subtitles, it's pretty funny how the tables have turned. What was once considered a necessity for the elderly has become a preference for the young, and it's all thanks to social media.
Nia Tipton is a staff writer with a bachelor’s degree in creative writing and journalism who covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on psychology, relationships, and the human experience.
