‘Screenagers’ Defy Stereotypes Of Generation X

Beavis and Butt-head they’re not. Nor are they whiny Generation Xers or angstridden slackers.

What today’s young people are, according to a notion gaining currency in marketing circles, are “screenagers” - technologically savvy consumers as comfortable surfing the Internet as they are talking on the telephone.

With 70 percent of them using a computer every day, they’re already starting to drive the market for PCs, CD-ROMS, on-line services and video games. And if corporate America wants their business, say market researchers, it had better let go of those pandering Generation X stereotypes - fast.

“This whole notion of ‘Generation X’ is just a manifestation of the baby boomers not understanding the succeeding generation,” said Iain Woolward, whose San Francisco ad agency, Woolward & Partners, has done focus group interviews with the post-boomer generation.

“What we’ve found is that they’re almost the antithesis of the Generation X stereotype,” he said.

“Screenagers” are not necessarily teen-agers. Woolward defines them as the 26.3 million Americans between the ages of 18 and 24.

In their awkward search for a rallying point for these young consumers, Madison Avenue has tried “Gilligan’s Island” trivia and Peter Frampton music. A better generational motif, says Woolward, is cutting-edge technology.

Forty-three percent of screenagers own their own PC, and another 26 percent plan to buy one.

“For (baby boomers), a computer is something we had to learn to use to be productive,” Woolward said. “But for screenagers, computing is hip and cool. They grew up with the technology, they’re comfortable with it, and they understand its implications.”