Which generation is the most sensitive? The answer to this question depends on who you ask. US psychologist Dr Jean Twenge has conducted multiple studies comparing the psychological traits of different cohorts and claimed that, compared with earlier generations, ‘Millennials’ (people born between 1981–1996) are especially prone to neurotic narcissism and anxiety, meaning that they have “…unrealistically high expectations [and] difficulty with criticism.”
Other research has failed to support these findings, however. For instance, a study of nearly half a million high school pupils in America between 1976–2006 found few if any differences in psychological traits across generations – including those like egotism and sensitivity to social status – that might reflect hypersensitivity.
What’s more, other studies have suggested that it’s actually older generations that are more sensitive. One published in 2019 that involved hundreds of people born between 1923–1969 found that it was those born earlier in the century who showed greater signs of hypersensitivity.
Yet another study, published in 2024, looked at changes in narcissistic traits (including hypersensitivity) over the lifespan and how this compared across different generations. The team found that narcissism tends to decline with age and that the way it did so was the same across the generations they looked at.
In fact, a key message from those last two studies was that hypersensitivity tends to decline with age – and that age is likely a more important factor than the generation you’re born into. It’s for this reason that some experts, such as the psychologist Prof Cort Rudolf, have gone so far as to argue that the very notion of discrete generations, such as ‘Boomers’ and ‘Gen X-ers’, is nonsense.
The cut-off for these generations is entirely arbitrary, he says, and your age and the influence of what’s happening in the world at any given time are far more relevant.
This article is an answer to the question (asked by Madison Halladay, Jersey) 'Which generation is the most hypersensitive?'
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