Young Outsiders

Twenge has studied the patterns of behavior between generations documenting their contrasts. With her knowledge and 25 years of experience in the field of psychology, she has found stark distinctions between work ethic, personal desires, physical and emotional responses. Twenge collected primary accounts from an iGen who gave her perspective on how her generation responds. The 13-year old under the alias, “Athena,” has testified these behaviors as valid.

For example, the older demographic (65+) looks at immigration much differently when compared to the younger demographic (18-30). The older demographic, composed of people 65 and older, is unsurprisingly more likely to stick to traditions and be more conservative as they have lived a long life and have worked for what they’ve got. This has led to them having a mentality of “ you work for it, you earn it.” Due to this most people who make up the older demographic would side with conservatives and say that lawbreakers should not have the same rights as those who obey the law. It’s also noteworthy to state that they fervently oppose an amnesty program as they view it as a reward for a crime which is something that strongly contradicts their belief of earning what you work for. Having worked hard the majority of their lives, they are not inclined to be generous with those who have not worked as hard as they have which has resulted in them favoring stricter border control to prevent any more undocumented immigrants from entering the country. On the other side of the spectrum the younger demographic, composed of people 18 through 30, are more likely to side with liberals on the topic of immigration. When it come to immigration policy many favor a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants as long as they meet certain requirements. While the younger demographic has a much more positive view on

According to the recent studies the older people as compared to the youth are becoming more economically and demographically attractive. However, there are costs of an aging population that the society bears as a whole. (Andrews, 2009)

There are currently six living generations in the United States, each with different characteristics, beliefs, and values. The things that define each generation’s culture are derived from their history, upbringing, and the lifestyle of their time. Our generation was born between 1980 and 2000. We are called Millennials. More specifically, we grew up in the South, which typically lends itself to being more conservative and religious. These characteristics, along with our instant gratification attitude, define who we are, what we believe, and how we view other generations. For example, we might have differing views with the Silent Generation. Some Millennials may feel the Silent Generation’s social, religious, and economic conservatism is outdated.

Abramowitz’s argument that the American electorate have become more polarized and that the moderate center is disappearing is more of a quantitative argument than a qualitative one. Based on election studies and exit polls, Abramowitz’ observations include the correlation between engagement, party identification, religious and social groups, ideological realignment, and education on the idealization and polarization of the public. Contrary to Fiorina, “there is no disconnect between the political elite and the American people. Polarization in Washington reflects polarization within the public, especially within the politically engaged segment of the public” (Abramowitz 2010, x). According to the ANES (American National Election Studies), the

There is "evidence in support of the idea that the parties have increasingly distinguished themselves even on longstanding issues since the early 1970s, with an especially noticeable boost during the Reagan years" (Stoker & Jennings, 2008, p. 629). Further support "demonstrate that individuals do, indeed, develop greater consistency between their partisan affiliation and their issue commitment as they age, with the greatest gains usually coming in early adulthood" (Stoker & Jennings, 2008, p. 629). If this is true, the Millenialls' partisan affiliation is developing now.

This idea is sustained by the Pew Report on Political Polarization, which reports a sharp increase of party polarization among the most engaged and active members of both the Democratic and Republican parties. According to Pew, “almost four-in-ten (38%) politically engaged Democrats are consistent liberals, up from only 8% in 1994 and 20% in 2004” (Pew, Polarization, Section 1). Clearly, involved members of parties contribute to the polarization of the parties to which they belong. In their essay “Is Polarization a Myth?”, political scientists Alan Abramowitz and Kyle Saunders rebut Fiorina’s conception of polarization-as-elite-driven, replacing Fiorina’s model with the theory that individual American voters are the vectors of political polarization. In “Is Polarization a Myth?”, Abramowitz and Saunders challenge five of Fiorina’s critical assumptions: that the American public consists largely of moderates; that, while differences between parties have increased, the increases have only been slight; that cultural and political differences between traditionally “red” and “blue” states are only marginal; that “social cleavages,” such as differences in age, race, or religious identification have decreased; and that the polarization of party elites contributes to a depression in voter turnout (Abramowitz, 543). Employing a survey

Today, the majority of self-identified Democrats or Republicans adhere to an ideological stance that their party proclaims -- they are the straight-ticket voters. At the same time, growing numbers of voters proclaim themselves “independent,” which implies that you vote based on educated judgments about the candidates. This new group of voters has created the “negative partisanship” phenomenon and caused “voters [to] form strong loyalties based more on loathing for the opposing party than on the old kind of tribal loyalty” (Chait).

Different ideologies tend to appeal to different demographic characteristics such as gender, class, race, etc. because a person’s background will affect which system of ideas they most closely align with. Liberalism and conservatism, for example, are ideologies that regularly contradict each other, because they appeal to different demographics based upon many factors such as class, race, gender, religion, etc. The general worldview of liberalism is that people have individual rights and liberty, while promoting progress. On the other hand, conservatism places greater importance of keeping tradition and strict regulation of rules. In determining the extent of appeal to different demographics, one must assess the ways in which both ideologies

Since the beginning of the Presidential primaries, many unexpected events have occurred, proving that we should expect the unexpected with the upcoming Presidential election. Both democratic candidates, Clinton and Sanders, and also the republican candidates, Trump, Cruz and Kasich, posses many differences amongst each other that can ultimately lead to the difference in demographics among each of the candidates’’ voters and the results that we have seen from the primaries. Ultimately, their difference in opinions on major issues and the difference in their voters will have a large impact on the standing of both the Republican and Democratic parties in the Fall 2016 campaign and beyond.

Generation X takes a conservative stance in politics. If one considers themselves conservative, that means they support the traditional order of the government and favor limited federal authority. There is a typical pattern followed by every generation. As the generation ages, it becomes more conservative overall. The explanation for this is that the older generation is being compared to the younger one and, in turn, seen as more

Generations can be loosely defined as bodies of individuals born and living at about the same time. “Each generation is molded by distinctive experiences during their critical developmental periods” (Twenge, 2008). The

Each generation has certain characteristics and values with which the members of it can identify. Members of Generation X highly value their job and family time; so they try to find a balance between these two aspects of their lives. Generation X are hardworking people, but they are

SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE “UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING GENERATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE WORK PLACE” ( Cited from Kapoor and Solomon 2011)

“My dear daughter, I do not know why you rarely talk your life to me since you became a senior high school student. If I made some mistakes, please let me know. I hope everything goes back like before”. These words come from a letter which was written by a mother to her 14-year-old daughter. What made the mother so frustrated and use such a sincere mood to talk to her daughter is the generation gap. The meaning of this word, generation gap, is the differences of viewpoints and the perceived psychological distance between the younger generation and the older generation in hobbies, habits, values, world view, and attitudes toward lives. In childhood, little girls like to imitate mothers’ behaviors, making up their faces with mothers’ cosmetics and dressing themselves with high heel shoes. Littles boys are more willing to play footballs or video games with their fathers, and the great majority of them admire their fathers most. However, as children grow older, parents have gradually felt it becomes harder to get along well with their kids because not only could not parents understand the children’s minds, but also their ideas are difficult to be accepted by children. As a result, problems caused by generation gap bursts, and it has a profound impact on both parents and children. To dope out a solution to this problem should consider these two questions: what causes the phenomenon and how it affects the relationships between children and parents.