For decades, Pew Inquiry Center has been committed to measuring public attitudes on key issues and documenting differences in those attitudes across demographic groups. One lens frequently employed by researchers at the Center to understand these differences is that of generation.

Generations provide the opportunity to look at Americans both by their place in the life bike – whether a young developed, a eye-aged parent or a retiree – and past their membership in a cohort of individuals who were born at a like time.

Michael Dimock
Michael Dimock, president of Pew Enquiry Center

As nosotros've examined in past work, generational cohorts give researchers a tool to analyze changes in views over time. They can provide a way to understand how different determinative experiences (such equally globe events and technological, economic and social shifts) interact with the life-cycle and crumbling process to shape people'due south views of the world. While younger and older adults may differ in their views at a given moment, generational cohorts allow researchers to examine how today'south older adults felt most a given effect when they themselves were young, also as to depict how the trajectory of views might differ across generations.

Pew Research Centre has been studying the Millennial generation for more than a decade. But past 2018, it became articulate to us that it was fourth dimension to decide a cutoff point betwixt Millennials and the next generation. Turning 38 this year, the oldest Millennials are well into adulthood, and they first entered machismo before today's youngest adults were born.

In lodge to proceed the Millennial generation analytically meaningful, and to begin looking at what might be unique virtually the next cohort, Pew Enquiry Center decided a yr ago to use 1996 as the concluding birth yr for Millennials for our hereafter work. Anyone built-in between 1981 and 1996 (ages 23 to 38 in 2019) is considered a Millennial, and anyone born from 1997 onward is part of a new generation.

Generation dominates online searches for information on the post-Millennial generation

Since the oldest among this rising generation are just turning 22 this year, and most are still in their teens or younger, we hesitated at first to requite them a name – Generation Z, the iGeneration and Homelanders were some early candidates. (In our first in-depth look at this generation, we used the term "postal service-Millennials" as a placeholder.) But over the past year, Gen Z has taken hold in popular civilisation and journalism. Sources ranging from Merriam-Webster and Oxford to the Urban Dictionary now include this proper name for the generation that follows Millennials, and Google Trends data show that "Generation Z" is far outpacing other names in people's searches for information. While there is no scientific process for deciding when a name has stuck, the momentum is clearly behind Gen Z.

Generational cutoff points aren't an exact science. They should be viewed primarily as tools, allowing for the kinds of analyses detailed above. But their boundaries are not arbitrary. Generations are ofttimes considered by their bridge, but again there is no agreed upon formula for how long that bridge should be. At sixteen years (1981 to 1996), our working definition of Millennials is equivalent in historic period bridge to their preceding generation, Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980). By this definition, both are shorter than the span of the Baby Boomers (nineteen years) – the only generation officially designated by the U.South. Demography Bureau, based on the famous surge in mail-WWII births in 1946 and a significant reject in birthrates after 1964.

Unlike the Boomers, there are no comparably definitive thresholds by which later generational boundaries are defined. But for analytical purposes, we believe 1996 is a meaningful cutoff between Millennials and Gen Z for a number of reasons, including key political, economic and social factors that ascertain the Millennial generation's determinative years.

The generations defined

Most Millennials were between the ages of 5 and xx when the ix/11 terrorist attacks shook the nation, and many were erstwhile enough to comprehend the historical significance of that moment, while near members of Gen Z have picayune or no retentiveness of the event. Millennials likewise grew upwardly in the shadow of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which sharpened broader views of the parties and contributed to the intense political polarization that shapes the current political environment. And well-nigh Millennials were between 12 and 27 during the 2008 election, where the force of the youth vote became part of the political chat and helped elect the first black president. Added to that is the fact that Millennials are the virtually racially and ethnically various adult generation in the nation'south history. Yet the side by side generation – Generation Z – is even more diverse.

Across politics, nigh Millennials came of age and entered the workforce facing the acme of an economical recession. As is well documented, many of Millennials' life choices, time to come earnings and entrance to machismo have been shaped past this recession in a fashion that may not be the case for their younger counterparts. The long-term furnishings of this "tiresome start" for Millennials volition be a cistron in American society for decades.

Engineering, in particular the rapid evolution of how people communicate and interact, is another generation-shaping consideration. Baby Boomers grew upward as television expanded dramatically, changing their lifestyles and connectedness to the world in primal means. Generation X grew up as the estimator revolution was taking hold, and Millennials came of age during the net explosion.

In this progression, what is unique for Generation Z is that all of the in a higher place have been part of their lives from the kickoff. The iPhone launched in 2007, when the oldest Gen Zers were x. By the time they were in their teens, the primary means by which immature Americans connected with the web was through mobile devices, WiFi and high-bandwidth cellular service. Social media, abiding connectivity and on-need entertainment and advice are innovations Millennials adapted to as they came of age. For those born later 1996, these are largely assumed.

The implications of growing up in an "always on" technological environment are just now coming into focus. Recent research has shown dramatic shifts in youth behaviors, attitudes and lifestyles – both positive and concerning – for those who came of age in this era. What we don't know is whether these are lasting generational imprints or characteristics of adolescence that will become more muted over the course of their adulthood. Beginning to runway this new generation over time will be of significant importance.

Pew Research Eye is not the first to draw an analytical line between Millennials and the generation to follow them, and many have offered well-reasoned arguments for drawing that line a few years earlier or later than where nosotros have. Possibly, as more information are collected over the years, a clear, atypical depiction will sally. We remain open to recalibrating if that occurs. Only more than probable the historical, technological, behavioral and attitudinal data will show more of a continuum across generations than a threshold. As has been the case in the past, this ways that the differences within generations can be just every bit great as the differences across generations, and the youngest and oldest within a commonly defined cohort may experience more in common with bordering generations than the one to which they are assigned. This is a reminder that generations themselves are inherently diverse and complex groups, not simple caricatures.

In the near term, you volition run into a number of reports and analyses from the Center that keep to build on our portfolio of generational research. Today, nosotros issued a report looking – for the beginning time – at how members of Generation Z view some of the key social and political issues facing the nation today and how their views compare with those of older generations. To be sure, the views of this generation are not fully formed and could change considerably as they historic period and every bit national and global events intervene. Nonetheless, this early look provides some compelling clues most how Gen Z will help shape the future political mural.

In the coming weeks, we volition exist releasing demographic analyses that compare Millennials to previous generations at the aforementioned phase in their life cycle to see if the demographic, economic and household dynamics of Millennials continue to stand up apart from their predecessors. In addition, we will build on our enquiry on teens' engineering use by exploring the daily lives, aspirations and pressures today's 13- to 17-year-olds confront equally they navigate the teenage years.

Yet, we remain cautious most what tin can be projected onto a generation when they remain and then immature. Donald Trump may be the outset U.S. president most Gen Zers know as they turn 18, and merely as the contrast betwixt George W. Bush-league and Barack Obama shaped the political debate for Millennials, the electric current political environment may take a similar result on the attitudes and date of Gen Z, though how remains a question. As important as today's news may seem, it is more than probable that the technologies, debates and events that will shape Generation Z are even so yet to be known.

We look forward to spending the next few years studying this generation as it enters adulthood. All the while, we'll keep in heed that generations are a lens through which to understand societal change, rather than a label with which to oversimplify differences between groups.

Notation: This is an update of a post that was originally published March 1, 2018, to announce the Middle's adoption of 1996 as an endpoint to births in the Millennial generation.