Generation Z (or Gen Z for short), colloquially known as Zoomers, is the demographic cohort succeeding Millennials and preceding Generation Alpha.
Members of Generation Z were born between 1997 and 2012, meaning the first wave came of age during the second decade of the twenty-first century, a time of significant demographic change due to fertility differentials and immigration. Youth of the early twenty-first century reach puberty earlier than their counterparts from the previous century. They have higher incidents of eye problems, allergies, awareness and reporting of mental health issues, suicide, and sleep deprivation, but lower rates of adolescent pregnancy. They drink alcohol and smoke traditional tobacco cigarettes less often, but are more likely to consume marijuana and electronic cigarettes.
Americans who grew up in the 2000s and 2010s saw gains in IQ points, but loss in creativity. During the 2000s and 2010s, while Western educators in general and American schoolteachers in particular concentrated on helping struggling rather than gifted students, American students of the 2010s were trailing behind their counterparts from other countries, especially East Asia, in reading and in STEM. They ranked above the OECD average in science and computer literacy, but below average in mathematics. Mathematical literacy and reading proficiency among American schoolchildren both fell in the 2010s.
They tend to become familiar with the Internet and portable digital devices at a young age, with possible implications for their mental health. However, they are not necessarily digitally literate, and they read books less often than their predecessors and spend more time in front of a screen.
Although they trust traditional news media more than what they see online, they tend to be more skeptical of the news than their parents. Politically, young Americans of the late 2010s and early 2020s tend to hold similar views to the Millennials. They are also more likely to be irreligious than older cohorts.
On the whole, they are financially cautious, and are increasingly interested in alternatives to attending institutions of higher education, with young men being primarily responsible for the trend. Among those who choose to go to college, grades and standards have fallen because of disruptions in learning due to COVID-19.
As consumers, Generation Z's actual purchases do not reflect widely reported polling results.
Nomenclature and date range
The name Generation Z is a reference to the fact that it is the second generation after Generation X, continuing the alphabetical sequence from Generation Y (Millennials). Other proposed names for the generation include iGeneration, Homeland Generation, Net Gen, Digital Natives, Neo-Digital Natives, Pluralist Generation, Centennials, and Post-Millennials. The term Internet Generation is in reference to the fact that the generation is the first to have been born after the mass-adoption of the Internet. The Pew Research Center surveyed the various names for this cohort on Google Trends in 2019 and found that in the U.S., the term Generation Z was overwhelmingly the most popular. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary has an official entry for Generation Z. Zoomer is an informal term used to refer to members of Generation Z, often in an ironic, humorous, or mocking tone. It combines the term boomer, referring to baby boomers, with the "Z" from Generation Z. Prior to this, Zoomer was used in the 2000s to describe particularly active baby boomers. Zoomer in its current incarnation skyrocketed in popularity in 2018, when it was used in a 4chan Internet meme mocking Gen Z adolescents via a Wojak caricature dubbed a Zoomer. Merriam-Webster's records suggest the use of the term zoomer in the sense of Generation Z dates back at least as far as 2016. It was added to the dictionary in October 2021.