Gen Z Wants to Disconnect from Digital Overload
- The Gen Z, who grew up with digital technology, would like to disconnect.
- Many young people want to limit their screen time.
- Professor Mathieu Alemany Oliver explains to TF1info the reasons for this disconnection.
The Gen Z, born between the late 1990s and the early 2010s, has evolved along with digital technology. They have been immersed in it. However, growing up with digital technology does not mean mastering time spent in front of screens. The proliferation of applications or being on screens for work and leisure can lead to a desire to disconnect. According to a study by INSEE (French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies) published in June 2024, one-third of internet users reported feeling at least one negative effect of screen time.
Younger individuals are particularly affected, with 57% of those under 20 and 49% of those aged 20-34 feeling this way. To mitigate these effects, 57% of 15-19 year-olds said they tried to limit their screen time, as did 49% of 20-24 year-olds and 50% of 25-29 year-olds. Why do young people want to disconnect? “It is primarily, in my opinion, a structural fatigue, related to usage, hence technological overload,” says Mathieu Alemany Oliver, a marketing professor at TBS Education, interviewed by TF1info.
Older Technologies as a Response to Digital Saturation
According to the expert, the use of connected devices and social networks as well as continuous exposure from childhood can result in “cognitive overstimulation”. “This overstimulation leads to a saturation of working memory that receives too much information, which creates difficulty in processing information, in prioritizing it, increased mental fatigue, and decreased performance in processing more complex cognitive tasks,” explains the marketing professor.
To disconnect, Gen Z is turning to analog technologies, as seen in the resurgence of popularity of the iPod, which allows listening to music without being connected to the internet. “Older technologies are a response to digital saturation,” indicates Mathieu Alemany Oliver. Unlike streaming platforms, listening on an iPod is limited to a storage space. “It forced us to ‘work,’ for example, to choose songs to download, make compromises with our playlist… The notion of work is important here,” he affirms.
Towards a New Relationship with Technology?
But is disconnection possible? “The phone is the subject of a real social dependency,” and “we have a form of addiction here,” says the professor. According to him, this desire to disconnect of Gen Z can lead to a “liberating relationship” with “more regulation, with technology that demands more intentional use from users and an increase in digital well-being.” Finally, Mathieu Alemany Oliver recalls that he asked his students if they would like to live in the 1980s and they unanimously answered yes. They mainly mentioned “social connection and the feeling of time passing more slowly, where not everything moves as fast as today.” If these answers are based on an idealized representation, they reveal “a different relationship to the world, a symbolic counter-model of the present,” concludes the marketing professor.
