Gen Z misery, explained in one chart
The kids, it's been suggested, are not okay.
For decades, established research showed that happiness and well-being levels tend to peak during youth in your late teens and 20s, drop during midlife, and rise again in old age. But this U-shaped happiness curve is now morphing, according to the results from a recent global study: Many of the world's young people are not flourishing.
'Young people — and this is a universal finding — in general, are not doing well,' says Byron Johnson, the director of the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University and a co-author of the study. 'That U is becoming a J. It's flattening. That's cause for concern, not just here in the United States, but it's cause for concern all over the world.'
The results come from the Global Flourishing Study, a multiyear project from researchers at Harvard and Baylor that uses survey data from Gallup to measure levels of well-being worldwide. Data was collected between 2022 and 2024 from over 200,000 adults in 23 countries and territories. To measure flourishing, researchers surveyed participants in core areas such as happiness and life satisfaction, mental and physical health, meaning and purpose, character and virtue, and close social relationships. Taken together, these dimensions represent the Flourishing Index Score, or how much a person is said to be flourishing. (Financial and material stability also play a role in flourishing, but were excluded when examining the relationship between flourishing and age.)
In the US and many other geographically and culturally diverse countries, young people between the ages of 18 and 29 do not appear to be flourishing. In Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Germany, Mexico, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States, flourishing increases with age. The gulf between young and old is most pronounced in the US, researchers found.
Today, Explained
Understand the world with a daily explainer plus the most compelling stories of the day, compiled by news editor Sean Collins. Email (required)
Sign Up
By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Notice . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
The findings are not universal. Hong Kong and Japan show the traditional U-shaped course of flourishing, while in India, Israel, Kenya, Poland, and Tanzania, flourishing decreases throughout the lifespan.
In the United States, the results of the study echo other research that shows young people are struggling. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 40 percent of high school students reported feeling consistently hopeless or sad in 2023, compared to 30 percent in 2013. Nearly half of Gen Z report often or always feeling anxious, per a 2023 Gallup and Walton Family Foundation survey. The American Psychological Association's 2023 Stress in America survey found young people experience more stress than older cohorts. Today's young people are lonelier than previous generations, another study found.
As additional waves of data are analyzed, researchers can identify what causes young people to struggle, Johnson says. Early observations have shown that religious service attendance contributes to flourishing.
'It could be that regular religious service attendance gives people purpose, maybe it gives them meaning in their life, and these are major factors in flourishing,' Johnson says. 'But maybe it also gives them support networks.'
Young people's lack of engagement in group activities more broadly could be impacting their well-being, Johnson says. Despite ranking highly in financial security, countries like the US and Germany fall behind in areas like close relationships, meaning, and purpose. Meanwhile, societal emphasis on individualism may make young people less inclined to engage with and support their neighbors and peers.
'Once you really, seriously think of others,' Johnson says, 'instead of just focusing on yourself, it is, in fact, a game changer for so many people.'
Social media is commonly cited as a culprit of young people's suffering, and Johnson believes it plays a role, due to the negative impacts of comparison online and forgoing in-person socializing for digital connection. But isn't the sole contributor, he says.
It could also be that young people's flourishing levels improve with age, time, and change in circumstances. Researchers will continue to survey the same sample of participants over the next few years to find out, Johnson says.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNBC
10 hours ago
- CNBC
Harvard study of nearly 50,000 women over 30 years finds coffee drinking linked to healthy aging, longevity: It seems to offer 'protective benefits'
Coffee, and whether or not it's good for you, has been a research focus for decades. A regular cup or two has been linked to better heart health, a longer life, and most recently, a study led by a Harvard researcher, Dr. Sara Mahdavi found that drinking coffee may even aid healthy aging in women. "The findings suggest that caffeinated coffee—not tea or decaf—may uniquely support aging trajectories that preserve both mental and physical function," said Mahdavi, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The paper, which was presented at the American Society of Nutrition's annual meeting, has not yet been published or peer-reviewed. But the findings are robust. Researchers followed 47,513 women over the course of decades, starting in 1984, and analyzed their health data and coffee-drinking habits. By 2016, only 3,706 participants were considered healthy agers. Factors that the researchers considered to define healthy aging were: The researchers considered additional lifestyle factors like smoking, exercise frequency and diet, and adjusted for their contribution to health outcomes. Participants were also asked to share how often they drank coffee, tea and either Coca-Cola or Pepsi, which can all be sources of caffeine. Women who had at least one cup of coffee daily were more likely to be among the healthy agers, the study found. Of the healthy agers, each extra cup of coffee they had each day was associated with a 2% to 5% increased chance of aging well, peaking at about five small cups a day. Drinking tea or decaffeinated coffee didn't have a clear connection to healthy aging in the study, and drinking cola drastically lowered chances of positive health outcomes. How much coffee per day leads to healthy aging is debatable. Mahdavi says drinking up to seven small cups of coffee daily was associated with healthy aging in the study, but whether or not that amount is healthy can shift depending on the person. Other recent studies have pointed to the potential health benefits of drinking coffee. A recent study of nearly 50,000 U.S. adults published this May found that having one to three cups of coffee a day could lower a person's chances of dying by around 15% within the following nine to 11 years, in comparison to those who didn't consume the drink. "Moderate coffee intake may offer some protective benefits when combined with other healthy behaviors such as regular exercise, a healthy diet and avoiding smoking," Mahdavi said in a press release. "While this study adds to prior evidence suggesting coffee intake may be linked with healthy aging, the benefits from coffee are relatively modest compared to the impact of overall healthy lifestyle habits and warrant further investigation."
Boston Globe
11 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Harvard has collected 3 million biological samples over decades. Now researchers may not have the money to preserve them.
The samples are kept at temperatures as low as minus-170 degrees Celsius (or minus-274 degrees Fahrenheit), in a network of liquid nitrogen freezers at the Chan School as well as at Brigham and Women's Hospital, according to 'If we really don't have any funding, we would lose the samples,' said Dr. Walter Willett, a Harvard professor and a principal investigator for the studies, in an interview. 'We're doing everything possible to not let that happen.' Advertisement The two programs affected are among the most comprehensive and long-running public health studies in the country. The Nurses' Health Study is A similar project, the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, tracks lifestyle and nutrition factors for men. Advertisement The two projects have yielded a number of landmark findings, including the link between alcohol consumption and breast cancer and the effects of trans fats on heart disease. The dataset generated from the massive project has informed countless additional studies by other researchers. Related : As part of the projects, researchers collected biological samples from roughly 350,000 individuals, monitoring various components, including nutrients, contaminants, and hormone levels. That research has been crucial to the growing understanding of factors that contribute to breast cancer, heart disease, and dementia, Willett said. 'Looking at what's going on inside the body a few decades before the disease occurs, that's what we can do [with the samples],' he said. 'That's really critical, because we know for many cancers, it's not what's in the blood or in the urine at the time of diagnosis, it's what was going on decades before that's probably most important. And we can go back to the samples and look at that today.' The collection of samples is among the most comprehensive in the world, Willett said. Its scientific potential — which will only increase as new research technologies are developed — is something that 'no amount of money can buy,' he added. Related : Both projects were funded in large part by two grants issued by the National Institute of Health's National Cancer Institute. Those grants were terminated on May 6, according to an affidavit filed by Willett June 2. Now, researchers are scrambling to keep the freezers running. Advertisement 'We have probably a couple of months worth of resources for paying our nitrogen bills,' Willett said. 'But the nitrogen company is very efficient in cutting off supply if we don't pay.' Though it's not clear exactly when the funding will run out, Willett said the research team may soon have to decide which samples are kept and which will be allowed to spoil. But because the sweeping nature of the study relies on having multiple samples from hundreds of thousands of people over a multi-year period, it's difficult to say which will be more useful for research purposes. 'We don't yet know who's going to get breast cancer,' Willett said. 'Which makes it impossible to predict exactly which samples will be the most valuable.' Nicole Romero examines samples on the campus of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health on June 11, 2025. Kent Dayton/Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Camilo Fonseca can be reached at
Los Angeles Times
2 days ago
- Los Angeles Times
The link between excessive napping and Alzheimer's disease
Imagine feeling even groggier after waking up from a midday nap. For many, this is a daily battle rather than a sporadic event. An unexpected connection between frequent sleeping and Alzheimer's disease has been shown by new research, exposing a concerning loop that may help us better understand this difficult illness. This finding challenges us to reevaluate our approaches to sleep and cognitive health, emphasizing the significance of our everyday routines, including even something as basic as napping. It also implies that our surroundings and lifestyle decisions may have a bigger impact on brain health than previously thought. The study The complex relationship between sleep patterns and Alzheimer's disease is examined in a study conducted by experts at the University of California San Francisco and Harvard. According to their research, taking too many naps may be an early sign of the illness. The desire to nap more frequently appears to be triggered by damage to brain regions that control alertness. Regretfully, these disturbed sleep patterns can accelerate cognitive deterioration, resulting in a harmful feedback loop from which it is difficult to break free. The study demonstrated the true connection between brain health and sleep. Researchers found that changes in sleeping patterns frequently correlated with early indicators of cognitive problems by concentrating on those who were in the early stages of Alzheimer's. This helps us understand how minor daily routines can occasionally indicate more serious, underlying health issues. It also highlights the need for more comprehensive studies into human health by posing significant queries about how stress, sedentary lifestyles, and chronic sleep deprivation may exacerbate these tendencies. How Alzheimer's affects sleep The buildup of proteins like tau and beta-amyloid in the brain is a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease. The buildup of these proteins interferes with our capacity to sleep soundly, in addition to impairing memory and thought processes. Excessive daytime sleepiness and a greater need for naps can result from damage to vital structures like the brainstem and hypothalamus, which are in charge of keeping us attentive. This exacerbates the situation over time by starting a self-reinforcing loop of cognitive deterioration and disturbed sleep. Remarkably, the study discovered that these proteins had the ability to disrupt our normal sleep-wake cycles. Therefore, even if an individual with Alzheimer's tries to maintain a consistent sleep schedule, their brain may not comply. Oversleeping may become a habit as a result of this fight, suggesting more serious neurological disorders. According to the research, this intricate interaction may also be influenced by variables like food, physical inactivity, and hormonal changes. Sleep as a warning sign The study's conclusion that altered napping patterns may indicate the onset of Alzheimer's disease is among its most convincing findings. It may be a sign of early disease-related brain changes if you or someone you know begins to nap more frequently or for longer periods of time, especially as they get older. Understanding this could pave the way for early detection and intervention, enabling medical professionals and caregivers to treat new symptoms before they worsen. This research highlights how important it is for people to monitor their own and their loved ones' sleep patterns. Even seemingly insignificant changes, such as longer naps or more daytime tiredness, may have bigger implications. Early detection of these changes may be essential for obtaining medical advice and enhancing long-term results. It also emphasizes how important frequent cognitive exams are for anyone with odd sleep patterns. Ending the cycle Despite the complexity of the link between excessive napping and Alzheimer's, knowledge of it gives hope for ending the cycle. Overall brain health can be improved by adopting better sleep hygiene practices, such as managing stress, minimizing screen time before bed, and maintaining a regular sleep pattern. Additionally, researchers stress the significance of evaluating sleep quality rather than quantity. Early detection of disruption may be made possible by tools such as wearable technology that tracks sleep cycles. When combined with heightened public awareness, these tools have the potential to revolutionize the way we approach Alzheimer's and related cognitive illness prevention treatment. Changes in lifestyle , such as frequent exercise, eating foods that are good for the brain, and doing mentally challenging activities may also help to maintain better sleep patterns and reduce the risk of cognitive decline. In the end, this study serves as a reminder that sleep is essential to our general health and well-being and is not merely a passive aspect of our daily schedule. One of the most important things we can do to safeguard our brain health for years to come is to be aware of how we sleep. Related
