Our youth is sad, and it is not an isolated case. It is not just a couple of young people feeling this way. It is not limited to a single class in a school, nor is it confined to a specific city. Youth around the world are suffering from sadness. But why? Why does the most connected generation in history feel like this? It sounds paradoxical, and it is, to be honest.
But that is the everyday reality for millions of young people: the most connected are the ones who feel the most alone. That’s what the Global Flourishing Study shows, a research project that collected data from more than 200,000 people across 22 different countries, led by Arthur C. Brooks, a professor at Harvard. The study is bleak: young people feel lonely, an existential void that can’t be filled with anything. What’s going on?
Hyperconnectivity, the big lie
The United States has been one of the countries where young people’s well-being has declined the most in recent decades, according to the World Happiness Report. And far from believing that life is now harder, what’s actually happening is that we’re less well connected.
According to Brooks, the relationships our young people are forming are not true or quality bonds, and the young people who break away from this “virtual” trend manage to be much happier than those who are trapped in likes, messages, and screens.
Happiness, according to this researcher, has a “U” shape, peaking in youth, dropping in adulthood, and then rising again in maturity—but that’s no longer the case. New generations no longer start from the top. Their curve starts low and stays flat for many years.
But… what’s going wrong?
What’s failing is not the technology itself, but the replacement of real human experience with a digital simulation. Face-to-face conversation has been replaced by immediate, mostly superficial interactions. The absence of physical and emotional contact not only affects social life, it destroys anyone’s self-esteem.
Also, we live in an age of immediacy. We want something, and we want it now. We’re not able to wait or build anything because there’s “something better” still waiting for us. Everything is a cycle: we seek out interactions to validate ourselves (of course, external validation), and when we don’t get it, our self-esteem crashes.
Richer, but much emptier
One of the most striking findings of the study is that the higher the income level, the lower the sense of having a life purpose. We’ve always heard that money can’t buy happiness, now we can add that material things can’t either. Far from fulfilling us, we are feeling more and more empty. For example, in our own country, nearly 30% of the population no longer identifies with any religion. The result? That “void” has been replaced with consumerism.
Of course, we’re not saying religion is the answer to everything, but the study itself shows that people with religious beliefs have 8% more spirituality than those who don’t.
No life purpose
Our takeaway is simple: money can buy comfort, but it doesn’t come with a purpose. And without a purpose, happiness becomes a mirage. Can we fill the emptiness with likes? Obviously not.
How can we avoid these emotional crisis?
Brooks suggests three immediate actions for those who feel stuck in this cycle and want to change:
- Prioritize real relationships: talk, hug, laugh with someone face to face. Humans were made for contact, not to stare at a screen!
- Cultivate your inner life: spirituality, in whatever form, will help you find a purpose that isn’t just likes.
- What is success? Fulfilment. Not physical objects but feeling at peace with yourself.
A generation is crying out for help. A generation that, despite having everything, feels like has nothing. Human beings weren’t made for loneliness, or for filling their emptiness with shopping, followers, or notifications. We need physical contact, a return to the basics, genuine friendships, deep conversations, caring about others, learning to love well again, and above all, feeling more!