Generations,We Hardly Knew Ye: An Obituary

Abstract

Although popular in the organizational sciences, in the media, and in practice, the concepts of “generations” and “generational differences” have been increasingly scrutinized based on theoretical, methodological, and statistical concerns. Here, we present a short obituary to bid adieu to these troubled concepts, with the hopes of memorializing and “putting to rest” these controversial ideas. We encourage researchers and practitioners to think beyond the narrow scope offered by the idea of generations, adopt a more critical perspective on our science and practice, and learn from the mistakes of the past.

Keywords

generations generational differences critical review obituary

“A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. . . . An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out, and that the growing generation is familiarized with the ideas from the beginning: another instance of the fact that the future lies with the youth.” Max Planck (1950, pp. 33 & 97)

Promoting skepticism about “what we do” in the fields of management, organizational psychology, and organizational behavior is important for the continued development of our science and profession (e.g., Rotolo et al., 2017). To this end, ideas surrounding the notion of “generations” have a unique ubiquity, and we would argue that they have assumed a form of “functional autonomy” (Astin, 1961). That is, the existence of “generations” and “generational differences” are taken as self-evident in many circles (e.g., in common discourse, in the media, and especially among organizational managers and consultants) and are rarely questioned. This is notable because we lack a compelling body of evidence that speaks to the existence of generations or the influence of generational differences across a wide variety of the outcomes and processes that we care about as organizational scientists. Our own research in this area has cast doubt upon the validity of generational frameworks for understanding work-related constructs, broadly defined (e.g., Rudolph, Rauvola, & Zacher, 2017; 2020; Rudolph & Zacher, 2017). Since we started this work about 10 years ago, we have seen some change in thinking around these ideas in the literature (e.g., Lyons & Schweitzer, 2017; Parry & Urwin, 2021). At this point, we must ask ourselves, is it now time to declare these concepts dead? It is clear to us that the generation concept is slowly, albeit steadily, beating a path toward the proverbial empirical dustbin. To advance and perhaps escalate this critical conversation, we take this suggestion a step further here. What follows is our obituary for the concept of generations.

Generations (b. 1927; d. 2022)

Born to functionalists (Manheim, 1927/1952), who sought explanations for social order and the stability of societies, generations were raised among 20th century sociologists as explanations for social change (Ryder, 1965). After a tumultuous youth (e.g., none of its guardians could agree upon its meaning or value; Kertzer, 1983), generations were all but abandoned as functionalism fell out of favor and gave way to more contemporary paradigms in the social and behavioral sciences (e.g., critical theories, which emphasize the role of power structures for maintaining order within societies; see also Agger, 1991; Bottomore, 1975). Even lifespan developmental psychologists eschewed their meaning and influence (e.g., Baltes, 1968, 1987).

Now orphaned, generations eventually found a home in the organizational sciences, where they were adopted innocently enough to make sense of the changing landscape of work (e.g., Galinsky, 2007; Joshi, Dencker, & Franz, 2011). At first, this adoption was welcomed; generations and generational differences offered simple and seemingly reasonable explanations for many of the dynamic phenomena we observe at work. Indeed, understanding the complexities of inter-individual differences and aging through the lens of generational categories offered a convenient (if not reductive) view of aging at work. Generations provided a heuristic “sensemaking” tool that distilled complex developmental phenomena into easy to understand and communicate qualities of a few groups rather than individuals. Early considerations touted the utility of generational differences to this end, and called for enhanced research to investigate their effects (Smola & Sutton, 2002). As evidence about (the lack of) generational differences amassed, questions began to emerge about their cumulative impact (as they often do; Kraiger, 1985). A meta-analysis was conducted to take stock of this literature; its conclusions were devastating: “The pattern of results indicates that the relationships between generational membership and work-related outcomes are moderate to small, essentially zero in many cases” (Costanza, Badger, Fraser, Severt, & Gade, 2012, p. 375). With the seeds of doubt thus sown, the concept of generations came under increasingly intense scrutiny.

First came the methodologists, who re-declared what was long known (Glenn, 1976)—it is impossible to empirically separate the influence of generations (or cohort effects) from age and contemporaneous time period effects (e.g., Bell & Jones, 2013). Next came the empiricists, who proclaimed that the results of generational differences studies do not triangulate with one-another (e.g., Lyons & Kuron, 2014). Finally, the statisticians had their say, noting that every inferential model that we use to study generations offers a different interpretation (Costanza, Darrow, Yost, & Severt, 2017). Generational differences ultimately succumbed to the rigors of the scientific method, as do many management fads (Abrahamson, 1991). In the end, there was no narcissism epidemic to be concerned with (Stronge, Milojev, & Sibley, 2017; Wetzel et al., 2017), work ethic was found to be cross-temporally stable (Zabel, Biermeier-Hanson, Baltes, Early, & Shepard, 2017), and there were notable inter-individual differences in intra-generational personal values (Weber & Urick, 2017). Ultimately, even once-staunch proponents of the concept began to reconceptualize generations as little more than “fuzzy” social constructs (Campbell, Twenge, & Campbell, 2017, p. 130; Twenge, 2017, p. 6). This was the final straw that ushered in the post-generational era.

Occasionally, a study of generations or generational differences still appears in a top-tier organizational science journal (e.g., Anderson, Baur, Griffith, & Buckley, 2017; Holtschlag, Masuda, Reiche, & Morales, 2020; North, 2019; Tang, Wang, & Zhang, 2017; Van Rossem, 2019). There is a fascinating persistence to this phenomenon and a comfort in being able to attribute otherwise complex age-related experiences to vastly oversimplified generational groups. Accordingly, generations are now a “big business” that helps to sell books, talks, and workshops run by organizational consultants who peddle their expertise in these flawed concepts. The persistence of generations is, to some degree, likewise reinforced by the continued use of generationalized language in scientific papers and in popular media (Rauvola, Rudolph, & Zacher, 2019) to (mis)classify people into generational groups (e.g., “Boomers,” “Generation Xers,” and “Millennials”). Accordingly, an important step in successfully navigating post-generational science and practice is to strike such imprecise and prescriptive language from our vernacular. To do so, we encourage people to adopt a lifespan developmental perspective on aging at work, which considers age along a continuum rather than in terms of discrete generational categories. Additionally, adopting a social constructionist perspective is useful as it offers that generations and generational differences do not actually exist, but are socially constructed phenomena based on widely held generational stereotypes and the socially accepted and sanctioned practice of broadly applying generational labels (see Rudolph, Rauvola, Costanza, & Zacher, 2020; Rudolph & Zacher, 2017).

Mannheim’s (1927/1952) original argument for the existence of generations was that for societies to change, new generations must disrupt existing patterns of thinking. In this spirit, albeit somewhat ironically, we offer this obituary to satisfy similar ends—to disrupt existing patterns of thinking about generations and generational differences. We hope that these efforts serve to reinforce existing calls for a formal moratorium to be placed on generations and generational differences research in the organizational sciences (e.g., Rudolph et al., 2017). We recognize that there exists a strong pull, especially from organizational consultants and the popular business and management press, to keep the idea of generations afloat. The simplistic appeal of generations will be difficult to overcome, however, as science often moves slowly and incrementally. Further embodying Mannheim’s (1927/1952) argument for generations and paraphrasing the quote that begins this musing, Planck’s (1950) principle offers that “science progresses one funeral at a time” (see also Azoulay et al., 2019). In our eyes, based upon the amassed evidence that speaks to the contrary, there really is no debate to be had about the status of generations. Put simply, the time is now to bid adieu to the concept of generations as a means for understanding human behavior. Rest in peace.

Footnotes

Associate Editor: Thomas Zagenczyk

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iDs

Cort W. Rudolph

Hannes Zacher

Author Biographies

Cort W. Rudolph, Department of Psychology, Saint Louis University, St. Louis, MO, USA.

Hannes Zacher, Wilhelm Wundt Institute of Psychology, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany.

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