Almost two-thirds of them have "tinkered" with a smartphone before turning 5, half of them even own one and use the device for almost 2 hours a day. They don't give too much importance to social relationships but on the other hand they are aware that the planet is suffering, know how to separate waste collection and even 15% dream of doing a job related to the care of nature and animals. This is how a research conducted by Bnp Paribas Cardif describes the Alpha Generation, that of children born from 2010 onwards. A detailed photograph, which tells us a lot about what adults today's children will be: just superficial and addicted to technology or also environmentalists and inclusive?
Until now, research had stopped at Generation Z, the children of the so-called Millennials: the first born in the new millennium, the second in the 80s. And they had already told us about the concept of “digital natives”. But the Alpha Generation is the first, according to Cardif's assessment, "360-degree digital native": that is, it is the first generation of a new humanity that "seems to know no barriers, neither between the real and the virtual, nor between men and women (finally, ed), nor between ethnic groups, and which has at heart - at least in words - the future of the planet". The identikit offers a rather obvious initial relevance: 62% of these children (who are at most 10 years old) have already used a device in the first half of their very young life. Even 53% already own one (although 84% of parents exercise parental control) and in all they spend 107 minutes a day glued to their smartphone or tablet.
Even the favorite activities are predictable: at that age the use is mainly playful, as it is natural that it is, and therefore games and videogame apps are popular, as well as watching videos and cartoons. Favorite social network is TikTok, as well as for previous generations, for example, a similar app like Snapchat had been. Even the "old" television, however, never goes out of fashion: during the lockdown, the percentage of those who took advantage of it to spend more time in front of the TV was higher (28%), than of those who suffered from the lack of friends (27%) or grandparents (20%). Even the use of free time (in general, regardless of the lockdown) sees "being with friends" only 29%, behind the 30% of those who even prefer to draw.
On the other hand, however, 84% of these very young people couldn't wait to go back to school after the months of distance learning, and a third of them have friends or companies of different ethnic groups. So will adults of the future be more inclusive? According to the research, most likely yes, just as it is practically certain that they will be more ecological: 39% already know how to separate waste collection, while over half of those questioned are concerned about the future of the planet and think humans should do much more to save it. Unthinkable data even just two generations go by, to which it should also be added that some children already have clear ideas about what they want to do when they grow up and 15% said they aspire to a green job that helps the environment and/or animals . However, the majority is still "old-fashioned": the two professions most dreamed of by boys are footballer and policeman, while for girls painters, photographers and dancers are always in fashion.
