Despite Having Unprecedented Access To Technology, Generation Z Is Already Bored (thedailybeast.com)

Taylor Lorenz, writing for The Daily Beast: There is a notion among older people that teens, with their smartphones and unlimited internet access, never experience boredom. CNN and other media outlets have repeatedly declared that smartphones have killed boredom as we know it. But today's teens are still bored, often incredibly so. They're just more likely to experience a new type of boredom: phone bored.

As members of what has been dubbed "Generation Z," a cohort that spans those born roughly between the years 1998 and 2010, today's teens and tweens have had unparalleled access to technology. Many have had smartphones since elementary, if not middle school. They've grown up with high-speed internet, laptops, and social media.

It's tempting to think that these devices, with their endless ability to stimulate, offer salvation from the type of mind-numbing boredom that is so core to the teen experience. But humans adapt to the conditions that surround them, and technical advances are no different. What seemed novel to one generation feels passe to the next. To many teens, smartphones and the internet have already lost their appeal.

Comments

Go outside!

[amazingxkcd]

Damn kids, get back on my lawn so I can kick you off

Re:Go outside!

[Penguinisto]

You're partially there.

As parents, one thing you can do to alleviate boredom is to get your kids outside to play when they're younger. To give them a part of keeping up the household (chores specifically), but also include them in the boring crap like teaching them like taxes and to keep a household budget (boring, but IMHO among necessary skills they'll need), to make them watch the news with you and... talk to them about it all along the way. To answer questions. To pay attention to them when they talk, to give advice when asked, and to guide them.

Most importantly, to get your kids off the damn phone/tablet/laptop/desktop and to help prepare them for the real world. This means that as parents, you yourself need to get off the damn phone/tablet/laptop/desktop, and interact with them.

TL;DR - busy kids aren't bored.

(...before my own kids grew up and left home, they regularly did their share of chores, watched me do the taxes, and asked a ton of questions along the way, helped in the garden, helped with building projects around the property, and similar. Even if you live in the city, there's a ton of activity that can be done that ultimately gives them a *huge* boost over their peers when they finally hit the Real World.)

Choice paralysis, not boredom

[Anonymous Coward]

Infinite options, infinite "boredom."

They're furniture

[mccalli]

I got into computing in the early 80s - the first home computing boom. They were new and fresh and exciting - I learned what I could about them, read obsessively in magazines about every home micro available, learned to code (badly in BASIC...) - it was all new.

Now? Computers and smartphones are appliances - they're not fun, they're not novel - they're meant to just sit there doing their job. And this is natural, it's not current generation's 'fault' that they're not excited by this tech. I wasn't excited by the fact I didn't need to double declutch to learn to drive, it was just how things were and are.

I'd be interested to know what is considered fresh and exciting in the same way. Seems that the use of these platforms is big, and the creation of things with them. But interest in the tech itself is less common, and I'm not surprised by this at all.

Creativity vs Boredom

[Virtex]

I remember when I was growing up, if I said I was bored my mom would always respond with, "if you're bored I can give you something to do." Of course being bored doesn't mean I have nothing to do. If that were true I could always find something to do, even if it just meant counting from one to a million. No, boredom comes from not having anything to do which I find interesting or stimulating. What I've learned is that I find far more satisfaction (and less boredom) by building or creating things. While it's easy to download a game on my phone or computer, I find it more stimulating to build my own. This is true even if the game is something simple like tic-tac-toe. Figuring out how to display the game, handle inputs, detect if someone wins, and build a decent AI is something I find interesting. Had I downloaded a tic-tac-toe game I would be bored with it, even though it would surely be more polished than my version. Not everyone likes programming, though, but there are a lot of areas that involve creativity: woodworking, sewing, painting, writing, cooking, landscaping, etc. It's just a matter of finding what you like.

Re: Of course they're bored

[c6gunner]

It has all to do with having hobbies that aren't passive consummation.

Honestly, that's my favourite type of consummation. Let her do all the hard work.

Re:And do what exactly?

[dbrueck]

It's true! And even if money were no issue, I still don't think I'd ever choose to live in Silicon Valley or someplace similar. I get that some people love living like that, but it's not for everyone.

Anytime a discussion comes up suggesting how awful the suburbs are (or similarly, about how much it must suck to live in a "flyover" state), I have this internal struggle of "wow that's totally at odds with my experience" vs "shhh... it's in your own best interest to let 'em keep thinking that". :)

Only boring people get bored

[Shotgun]

Yeah, I said it. You get bored because you're not willing you exercise yourself. You're sitting around waiting for someone else to be creative to stimulate you. Well, guess what, any environment will eventually become "normal", and observing a "normal" environment is boring. It is only when you're actively involved in changing, manipulating, improving your own environment that you see it as ever changing and exposing more detail.

You don't have to go outside. You don't even have to put down your phone. But, you do have to change from a consumer into a producer if you want to avoid boredom.