[et_pb_section][et_pb_row make_fullwidth="off" use_custom_width="off" width_unit="on" use_custom_gutter="off" padding_mobile="off" allow_player_pause="off" parallax="off" parallax_method="off" make_equal="off" padding_top_1="40" padding_bottom_1="20"][et_pb_column type="4_4"][et_pb_text admin_label="Title" background_layout="light" text_orientation="center" text_font_size="52" use_border_color="off" border_color="#ffffff" border_style="solid" custom_padding="10||10|" text_text_color="#666666"]<strong>World View Of Today's Adolescents</strong>[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type="4_4"][et_pb_text admin_label="Content" background_layout="light" text_orientation="left" use_border_color="off" border_color="#ffffff" border_style="solid" custom_padding="20||20|"]<p>The change in today's youth is often thought to be a result of social media and the internet, but YTN's study of youth and the same shift in Europe seventy years ago led us to a different conclusion.  We believe that the explosion of social media is a response to a shift in the mindset or worldview of our younger generations.</p>

<p>A significant shift has occurred in the fundamental way young people view their world similar to what happened in Europe seventy years ago.  Today most adults/parents have a fundamentally modern view of the world, but a majority of youth has a post-modern worldview.  Worldview can be a nebulous concept and may best be described as how one perceives and evaluates their surroundings, information, relationships, as well as draws conclusions.</p>

<p>A majority of adults today have a modern worldview.  They evaluate their world through a factual or more knowledge based paradigm.   Moderns tend to value knowledge, evidence, science, and higher education.  In short they gather information or facts to make decisions for themselves.  As a result moderns are more performance driven.</p>

<p>Today a majority of youth is post-modern.  They view and evaluate their existence based on very different criteria. Post-moderns value authenticity, community and experience more than knowledge, facts and evidence.  As a result as they gain information they do not draw conclusions on information alone.  Instead they process information through a more relational, experiential grid.  They take the information and assess whether that information will work for and within their community and family.  They assess its authenticity or truthfulness upon an experience that either confirms the knowledge works or does not.  Post-moderns are fundamentally skeptical of knowledge and truth given the barrage of often conflicting information our "modern culture" has created that is thrown at them at a volume far greater than what we experienced when we grew up.</p>

<p>As a result post-moderns seek authentic relationships and community as a more fundamental need than knowledge and information. When combined with the increasing involvement of adults in youths’ lives over when we grew up and youths’ inescapable feeling that they cannot be honest with adults, the explosion of social media makes sense. They seek to create a sense of community in a culture where neighborhoods and community have to a large degree broken down.</p>

<p>The impact of these differences on the parent adolescent relationship should not be overlooked.  As parents take an information, knowledge-based approach with their kids, it frustrates their kids who by contrast want to have healthy, authentic relationships within their family that validate the information parents are using to motivate them to perform.</p>[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section]