NextGen

Poll: Younger Americans Yearn for a Lost World, Technologically Speaking

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Most Americans, including a large number of those aged 18 to 34, prefer to live in pre-internet world, according to a Harris Poll conducted for Fast Company.

Sixty three percent of that group, which has no memory of a world before social media, agreed that they would like to return to a time before people had wide access to the internet and smartphones. Thirty-seven percent disagreed, according to the poll. Seventy-seven percent of those between 35 and 54—the midrange of the millennial generation— also would like to return to an analog era. And 60 percent of those over 55 felt that way.

Despite those sentiments, 90 percent of the  respondents said they believed in the importance of being open-minded about new technologies. Half of the respondents said that they generally adopt new technologies before most people they know.

Misgivings about rapid technological innovations exist, however. Fifty-seven percent of those under 35 agreed that technology divides, and 43 percent disagreed.

The poll was conducted earlier this month, as people confronted the implications of ChatGPT and other generative-AI tools, as well as items such as Apple’s Vision Pro.