Derek Thompson

Yeah, the TikTok trend that my wife pointed me to when I was writing my feature story was what some folks call cancellation.

The idea that people would record themselves dancing when someone canceled a plan with them.

They would essentially be like, oh, it's absolutely fantastic that it's a Friday night and I can just stay at home and don't have to go out.

I wanted to stay at home and watch Netflix anyway.

And it's really interesting to think that you're looking at a generation

that is spending more time alone than any generation on record, and they're also celebrating when their social plans are canceled, right?

This speaks to not just a loneliness crisis, I think that's misdiagnosed, but a phenomenon of chosen

aloneness, which seems very different and speaks to exactly what you found in this piece, not just maybe rising neuroticism, but certainly declining extroversion, right?

Less motivation to even put yourself out there in the first place.

So I, again, asked the psychologist, Lisa Damore, what do you think is causing this, right?

Like it's easy to say, blame the phones.

Maybe the phones are to blame, but it's certainly common to say, just blame the phone.

So what does an actual child psychologist think about this?

Here's what she told me, quote, in terms of what's causing this,

Here's an unsexy answer.

When it comes to a trend that is observed at the population level, I think we should assume there are many factors at work, some contenders.

One, the pandemic for the extroversion finding.

Two, the rise of a wellness industry that is often heavily focused on the self as opposed to being focused on others.

Three, algorithmically driven digital environments that readily create psychological silos.

So number three, I think we've covered.