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70% of Gen Z Incorporates a Mental Illness Into Their Identity
Join us as we navigate the evolving landscape of personal identity in younger generations, with a focus on the role of mental health, societal changes, and cultural frameworks. From the alarming rise in mental health diagnoses to the merging of gender and mental illnesses with core identities, we delve into the psychological and societal impacts of these trends. Explore the challenges of self-diagnosis, economic barriers to professional help, and how structured ideologies like cultural heritage and personal responsibilities can shape a healthier self-concept. Through various examples, including the use of AI in creativity, we offer insights into crafting an empowering and balanced personal identity in today's dynamic world.
Simone Collins: [00:00:00] 73 percent of boomer males. No matter what psychological challenges I face, I will not let them define me. 72 percent of Gen Z females. Mental illness is an important part of my identity.
Malcolm Collins: This chart right here that we're looking at is absolutely shocking to me. What the, what it's looking at is quote, mental health challenges are an important part of my identity in quote. And then it's looking at how this has changed over time, where if you look at males who are boomers, only 27 percent would say that mental health challenges are an important part of their identity.
Whereas if you look at. Gin Z emails, a full 72 percent say mental illness is an important part of my identity. Now I want to point out here, not even 72 percent of the population has a mental illness or a real mental illness, I guess I and yet 72 percent of young women are [00:01:00] identifying with a mental illness as an important aspect of who they are.
Simone Collins: And I
Malcolm Collins: really wanted to dive deep on The negative psychological effects of this to an individual. Why this is a really dangerous thing that this is happening. How this comes downstream from the destruction of our religious systems and understanding. Because I think for a lot of people as they destroyed and eroded the concept of a soul.
They needed something to replace it. Something that described, Who they were and that they could identify with in sort of a deeper sense. And I think for many people that became either gender or a mental illness or gender and a mental illness. Well,
Simone Collins: or you can say intersectional identity and victimhood as well.
Malcolm Collins: Yes. And for people who are like, well, how bad is it for males? 67 percent of males in Gen Z identify with a mental illness as a major part of their personality. If you were looking at millennials, [00:02:00] it's 67 percent of women. So the same as Gen Z males and, and for males 56 percent now, this is interesting to me, even if you're talking about millennial males, Over half of them identify with a mental illness as being a primary part of their identity.
Simone Collins: That checks out given the young, younger people that we've spoken with and people in our own generation.
Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And where was the big jump here? Well, the big jump started with Gen X. So our generation. No,
Simone Collins: just above our generation is Gen X. We're millennials. And then below us is
Malcolm Collins: Oh, Gen X is above us.
Simone Collins: Yeah, Gen X is, is, so we have the greatest generation.
These are the people who fought in World War II, the last generation. This is the generation that was too young to fight in World War II in the United States. Then we have the boomers who were the children of the World War II war heroes. Then we have Gen X which came after the boomers. Then we have millennials.
Then we have [00:03:00]
Malcolm Collins: Okay. We
Published on 1 year, 2 months ago