Culture & Community: 9/11 May Not Mark Generational Divide

Children of the Great Depression sought stability, those coming of age during World War II were stoic, duty-driven team players, and early Baby Boomers were hedonistic social activists. How will those coming of age around the time of the fall of the twin towers be affected by that event?

Charles D. Schewe, a marketing professor at the University of Massachusetts and well-known author on generational cohorts, says the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 jolted the nation and the people who were coming of age at that time, but it’s unclear whether these events mark a true watershed moment with the intense impact of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy or the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Schewe is the co-author of several books and has extensive experience as a business consultant. The idea of generational cohorts says that groups of people develop a different and distinct set of core values for their entire lifetime that are formed by so-called “coming-of-age experiences” that occur between the ages of 17 and 23, Schewe says. The “defining moments” often are dramatic: wars, political dislocations, assassinations, or economic upheavals. The Great Depression, Pearl Harbor, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the turmoil of the Watergate scandal are examples.

So was 9/11 a defining moment? Schewe says it’s not clear. Like Pearl Harbor Day, September 11 engendered a pride, a gut appreciation of the freedom of movement and freedom from fear that Americans enjoy. At the same time, there was a seed of fear of physical harm that was planted for many school-age people by the Columbine High School shootings in 1999. September 11 has widened that fear and made it more intense for some young people, Schewe says.

Schewe says experiencing these events forges a shared set of values for each generational cohort. Those who came of age during the Depression sought stability in employment and their lives and they kept canned goods in the basement. Those who were in the Pearl Harbor/World War II generation were stoic, duty-driven team players. Early Baby Boomers were hedonistic and social activists reflecting the Post-war economic boom, while trailing edge Baby Boomers were more cynical and suspicious of authority based on experiences of Watergate, the end of the Vietnam War and the gasoline crisis of the 1970s.

The bigger question is whether the events of 9/11 have created another new cohort, perhaps a Generation 9/11, with its own unique set of values within the United States, or whether this event simply reshapes and intensifies the character of the current generational cohort. Schewe says initially at least, 9/11 produced a series of adjusted values. “We became intensely patriotic, sensed a need to be with family and loved ones, and sought to dispel fear with any sense of security,” he says. “The typical phases of reaction to unexpected events – shock, disbelief, distraction and then anger, gave way to increased participation in religion, a sharp decrease in divorce, and a surge in bigotry through racial profiling of Middle Eastern people.”

But do these value shifts remain intact today? And do those in the “coming of age” years during 9/11 hold and still reflect those values? Patriotism was reflected in the display of American flags on cars, buildings, even clothing. But within a year, the Wall Street Journal in a cover story pointed to how tattered flags littered the highways and few were retrieved by citizens. Patriotism had waned. Americans returned to their usual ways in other quarters as church attendance and divorce rates returned to pre-9/11 numbers. In short, the initial reactions dissipated.

Interviews with 20-somethings who were in college on September 11, 2001, conducted in 2005 found that they were more skeptical in their feelings of patriotism. They were less “rah-rah” and more philosophical about their country, and indicated a greater global perspective in their lives, Schewe says. Interviews in 2006 reinforced this finding. Students seem to meld 9/11 with the negative feelings of the Iraq war, seeing the two events as part of a single defining moment. Participants in both studies seemed much more critical of government. They strongly disagreed with the military and political responses to 9/11.

Charles Schewe’s latest book is Defining Markets, Defining Moments: America’s 7 Generational Cohorts, Their Shared Experiences, and Why Businesses Should Care, co-authored with Geoffrey E. Meredith and Janice Karlovich. It can be obtained as an e-book at http://www.booklocker.com/books/2780.html.

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