Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61

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Futures

jou r nal h o mep ag e: w ww .e lsev ier . co m / loc ate / fu tu r es

Pessimistic futures generation for pessimistic future generations?The youth has the future but the older has the authority

Peter Molnar 1, Zoltan Vass *

Vorosmarty Mihaly Gimnazium, Horanszky 11, 1083 Budapest, Hungary

A R T I C L E I N F O

Article history:

Available online 14 December 2012

A B S T R A C T

In this paper the German-Hungarian international representative comparative youth

surveys have been used as basic reference points (15–24 years old youth, 1984/1985). The

social changes in the last decade have had a dramatic effect on both the Hungarian and

German societies, which are represented by university students’ opinion as well (1985–

2000). The civilization theory of Margaret Mead proved to be a useful principle in

interpretation of the common European youth cultural style. At the radical social changes,

common high pessimistic characteristics can be found in the relation of the future-

orientation and generations’ attitude scale of German and Hungarian youth. In the 10–15

year period after the political system change significant difference can be observed in the

future-orientation of German and Hungarian youth attitude. In this paper we discuss in

detail the connection between the pessimistic youth attitude and its effect on sustainable

development. We argue that sustainable development can be imagined only if the

optimistic youth attitude has effect on the negative demographical changes in Europe. Our

goal was to discover new life sentiments which can be detected from the opinions of

today’s Hungarian youth. According to our hypothesis, young people experience the

enlarging process of EU as peripheral participants representing that both the optimistic

and pessimistic youth attitudes equally refuse to grow up more children in family, which

suggest that the sustainable development is not in the focus of their future orientation.

� 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction of the concept of future orientation

The original future image notion is represented by psychology but there are other disciplines in which the similarexpressions of future image with similar meanings can be found. In our everyday communication and in the media as wellthe phrase future image is used more often. Unfortunately it does not mean that those who use this phrase are aware of theappropriate meaning and notion of it. The inventiveness and ingenuity of the Hungarian language is the other cause of thepopular usage of future image/popularity of future image. In other languages future planning future perspective, especiallyclose to psychology future orientation (Jugend-81) is used to express the same meaning instead of future image. In case ofendeavor to understand the long term of social changes, it should be clearly defined whose future and which social andcultural environment we are interested in. While the economical forecast and concrete operational plans can be describedand discussed in detail, unfortunately, the social and individual future plans are supported on less trustable and obscure

* Tel.: +36 17083313.

E-mail address: zoltanvasspet@yahoo.com (Z. Vass).1 Dr. Peter Molnar, an outstanding sociologist, passed away after submitting their paper. Hence he was unable to finalise and update the survey data

during the editing process. With respect to his outstanding contribution to youth research, the editors of the special issue made the decision to publish the

paper posthumously in its latest version.

0016-3287/$ – see front matter � 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2012.11.012

P. Molnar, Z. Vass / Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61S56

information and future image. Therefore it contains only the achievable aims instead of the necessary steps which areobligatory to proceed. In our modern world, in the confidence of the missing integrated world future image, the obscureword which reflects to future image is used purposely to indicate the instability of our economical and cultural environment.The emerging problem is that the content of future image cannot be carefully considered by the expert of different disciplines[1]. Therefore in the field of psychology the problem of the obscure and not well-defined future image used in Platoon workscannot be solved. Surprisingly the modern physics in its thinking returns to the supervision of the original Platoon’smetaphor in the hope to be able to work out a unified theory about the world. To start from this sphere of thought, the notionof future image has to be sharply separated from the economic plans which suggest that our social environment and changescan be forecasted on the basis of deterministic economical models. On the basis of our experience this kind of self assuredbehavior in the economic forecast originates from the wrong practical experiences instead of well based and establishedtheoretical concept. The evidence of this can be found in the careful exploration of the time series data to the future image inthe field of economy. Therefore we should be careful if we want to find the right thinking about the content of social andindividual future image in the youth life period which is extremely sensitive to the environmental influences due to thespecialty of human developmental period. In the next paragraph we introduce the adolescence and future orientationtheoretical starting point on the basis of a well-known expert called Nurmi [2]. According to Nurmi the psychological processof future image or future orientation consists of three well differentiated items: motivation, planning, appraisal/valuation.Highlighting the conscious process of future orientation, future image is the manifestation of this conscious process whichcan be examined methodologically by attitude questionnaire. In chronological order the first aspect of Nurmi’s futureorientation is the motives and values and their expectations concerning of future. Although the clearance of the notion ofmotivation is out of the focus of this paper, we would like to sign that nowadays in the theory of motivation, two oppositedirections (pressure-needs, pull-aims) can be found. Nurmi in his works clearly proposes the process of anticipated life-spandevelopment. Therefore in future orientation, in the notion of sequence and chronological order, the motivation andconsciousness can be equally found. In youth during the process of social integration different information processing isrequired about the undertaken activities, e.g.: on the one hand the estimation of the material environment surrounding uswhich are necessary to achieve our aims and on the other hand we need information about those people who are able toinfluence and verify the process of achieving our aims.

2. Introduction of the Shell studies [3]

The Hungarian youth research (1985) was constructed on the basis of the ‘‘Shell’’ German youth research series (1954–2002), which responded to the question of whether there is a unified formational process in both of the societies or twodifferent formation theories existed. Deficiency of Hungarian youth research is such that, there is not enough data to judgethe state of Youth. So, in order to supplement this deficiency, we have done a German-Hungarian internationalrepresentative comparative youth study (15–24 years old).

As a starting point we have compared the following generations with representative samples (n = 800–800):

� G

erman youth who were aged 15–19 in 1984 � G erman youth who were aged 20–24 in 1984 � H ungarian youth who were aged 15–19 in 1985 � H ungarian youth who were aged 20–24 in 1985 � T he Hungarian middle aged generation, who were the youth of the 60s (aged 35–39) � T he Hungarian older generation, who were the youth of the 50s (aged 50–54) � T he German older generation, who were the youth of the 50s (aged 50–54)

We had a chance to analyze the time series data from 1985 to 2004 and we have been able to observe real social changesand youth activity in this critical period of Europe. In 1989, we have already found surprisingly that the future orientation ofHungarian students follows the quick social changes and it is possible to interpret these data by Mead theory [4,5].

2.1. Attitude scales

In the consequences of social changes in Germany the youths’ generations’ attitude scale is interpreted as anindividualization process. The most important was done by Zinnecker and Molnar in 1984/1985 when we had to find amethod – at the planning of the investigation which contained common principles and methods of interpretation in spite ofcultural divergence [6]. Referring to the subjective side of socialization and taking into account the youths own opinionindicates the difference from the earlier studies. According to Mead’s idea of future-orientation, Watts and Zinnecker [7] hadprepared a youth-centered scale to measure generation gaps. The content of future-orientations can be controlled withcorrelation of the next attitude scales.

2.1.1. Youth-centered scale (generations’ attitude scale)

The starting point of this scale is the conflict between youth and adults. This scale has been called ‘‘youth centered’’ ininternational research. In society, adults show the traditional way to live to developing youths, but the aim of youth is to

P. Molnar, Z. Vass / Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61 S57

choose among these traditional behaviors, and adapt them successfully. Adults can be a role model for them, when adults actas a supervisor or moral guide in everyday life. Following adults’ examples means refuse the adults norm, and this is thestarting point of conflict. Our scale runs from pragmatic and positive attachment to adults to pessimistic and negative,strained relations. Zinnecker’s earlier research found that the adult oriented behavior of youth is influenced by positiveattitude toward adults and the time which was spent with adults either was a remarkable factor. On the other hand, youthwho are characterized as youth-centered, are opposed to adult’s culture and rules. This scale attempts to eliminate the gap inthe research of political attitude. In modern youth culture, since the 1970s well-observed changes in identity feeling wereobserved and measured by the following generations’ attitude scale, on subjects between 15 and 24 years old [8].

2.1.2. Self-actualization scale

In this orientation pattern, the individual is protected successfully against environmental factors, which means the youthovercomes this period. Individual aim and desire appear in real opportunity form, so we talk about self-fulfillment, whichappears to be a real danger to youth as a social difficulty. Actually, this behavior pattern is used by youth. So the refusal of thispattern has not been characterized, but it happens. The criticism is directed at this orientation attitude. Self-actualizationpatterns express the impulse of autonomous demand and the feeling of a successful lifestyle. The aforementioned datameans that youth cannot keep any distance from everyday life’s social norms, so they try to battle against the eldergeneration’s aims and social norms.

2.1.3. Privatization scale as ‘‘storm and stress’’ (youth rebellion)

In the traditional orientations scale Schelsky [9] marked a connection between the self-actualization and privatizationscale. In some new German research a privatization scale is used to describe it, which is not quiet understandable in Hungary,because this term is used only in the economic field. In Germany, this scale expresses two relations between individuals andsociety, and youth turn away from their social-corrections process, and look for their own basis of identity. This orientation ischaracterized as defense, which is accepted as an independent claim. The individual can find any connection point to societyto influence it. They are not able to use social elements to build their identity; consequently they try to find any other way toavoid social effects. This has not been characterized as a naive criticism, but it has been expressed as a strong demand not todisturb their success in life or even society. For youth, that is characterized by this attitude and cannot be easily interviewed.In traditional psychology and everyday use, the resistance of youth and revolt are viewed through the pattern ofprivatization orientation.

2.1.4. Conformity scale

In this dimension, the relation between the individual and the world around them is worthless, because they do not fit inwell. There are no other chances to adapt to the social world around us. Suppose at this point the balance is very unstable,between individual and social self-concepts. The scale expresses the aims and desires that can be found in a small part of thissocial pattern. It is as an unknown region, which restricts our life possibilities, but we have to live with this idea. On this scalethe youth feel the society as an obstruction, but they have to live together with it. This notion does not express, in itself thevalue judgment, but rather the external control [10].

2.1.5. Future-orientation scale

The main characteristic of human thinking and reaction is the preparation for expected future events, which is usuallyreferred to as future-orientation. The concept of future-orientation does not derive from social-psychology or attituderesearch, it has deep connection with anthropology and developmental psychology [11]. According to Nurmi thepsychological process of future-orientation contains three sequential elements: motivation, planning and evaluation. Thefirst point of Nurmi’s future-orientation is the motivation of expected existence. Although it is not a goal of this article todefine the idea of motivation, it should be emphasized that the theories of motivation demand two tendencies, namely, thepressure, which requires the satisfaction of our needs and the goal value, which appears in our aim and it consists of cognitiveelements [12]. He discusses both theoretical elements of motivation. We have to take good care if we want to find outeverything about the content of future-orientation and its experimental methods. The continuation at the firstdevelopmental stage the ‘‘sense of basic trust’’ is a temporal perspective; it is the adolescent’s ability to express time, as adimension of human existence, and takes into account future-orientation as a time factor. So we can consider two criticaldevelopmental periods: the level of operational thinking and the adolescent’s identity crises. The theory of identityformation has been derived from Erikson, who has personal interaction with Margaret Mead [13]. The adolescent has to re-elaborate the previous phase of identity formation. The trust and optimism created in the first year of life appears again in theyears of adolescence, as a perspective of time. We have at first a simple question: How do you see the future of society –pessimistic or optimistic? In the better scale we have more items about the damaging problems of society. There are theproblems of economical and technical development and the political danger of war.

2.1.6. The results of Shell studies highlighting the future-orientation scale

The relation of future-orientation and generations’ attitude scale [14] is discussed at first in a representative sample oftwo countries for 15–24 year old youths based on the German Shell research tradition and secondly on the time-seriessample of Hungarian university students. The estimation of the university students’ opinions can be realized on the existing

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methodological background of Hungarian and German comparative youth research. On the one hand, this refers to thecalibration of the employed scales and on the other hand it means that the selection process from university students andskilled workers are on the two poles. Description of skilled workers deviant behavior is not in the scope of this paper. If weexamine earlier issues of international research, we can find some surprising results. In 1985, in a collective Hungarian-German representative youth study we found a big difference between student opinions. In 1981, 42% of the Germanstudents answered in optimistic way and in 1985, 67% of the Hungarian students answered the same way. This differencedisappears in 1989 (48%) as the students became more and more sensitive to the problems of social charge. The mostoptimistic future orientation of Hungarian students can be found to be 70% in 2004.

2.2. The optimistic youth attitude and its relation to sustainable development

In Hungary, the condition of young people is fundamentally influenced by demographic processes and opportunities foremployment. Demographic processes direct attention to the dangers that the opposition of interest between younger andolder people is not disappearing and the aging process in society is becoming increasingly dramatic. The expecteddisproportionate change in the ratio of younger and older people affects the whole European continent. As a result, althoughlacking in our public life, the so-called generational contract was introduced in Europe. The point is that actual conflicts ofinterest are arising between younger and older people. The true question in an international comparative study is whetherthe political changes have accelerated or decelerated this process?

As we mentioned earlier, in Hungary, the condition of young people is fundamentally influenced by demographicprocesses and opportunities for employment. The most comprehensive approach created during the previous governmentcycle was more unambiguous regarding the fact that ‘‘the political tasks within the concept of population policy can be thecoordination of various, widely interpreted social policies affecting welfare, and the living conditions of people and families.An important part of the coordinative tasks is the shaping of public opinion, which acknowledges the societal value of raisingchildren, and considers health as an asset to be preserved, and to increase the number of years that can be spent in goodhealth’’.

Today’s government accepts this thought with the complementation that a new governmental thinking is needed inorder to decrease the rift between the poor and the wealthy. ‘‘As the Prime Minister said in his State of the Countryspeech, those who are wealthy, have to do more in the community than those facing daily problems, and they have tocontribute more to the public good. Poverty is a big problem, but it is much worse if a family gets stuck in povertybecause their child drops out of school and later faces difficulties in getting work. We know that the health of poorpeople is also more fragile.’’

We wish to discuss the following aspects of implementing the government position based on the experiences of thestudy: the work opportunities of young people based on EU norms, the educational and child raising conditions in the familyand in institutions, the contract with the older generation in Europe becoming increasingly older.

2.2.1. Young people: hope or reality

Based on our results, which can only be regarded as prognostic, it is our view that young Hungarians today prefer workand study abroad. The emergence of this phenomenon puts two factors into the center:

� it

directs attention to the significance of studying and the acquisition of useful knowledge. This is essentially the same asamong young people in today’s EU member states � b ut the fact that young people wish to use their acquired knowledge abroad, directs attention to the danger that young

people are not satisfied with work opportunities in Hungary.

In comparison with the requirements of the European Union, excessive hopes should not be dismissed, the demandsinherent to them can be utilized by the Hungarian government, namely, education is an economic sector which significantlyincreases the demand of society for qualified workforce. The question is how this brings a return for the economy. Thewidening of the educational market and a workforce which serves better the needs of new production structures will becomethe source of economic growth, but, as it is emphasized, only if the fruits of growth are more evenly distributed amongemployers. ‘‘Instead of only a part of the workforce potential profiting from the new labor organizational forms andtechnological changes, one has to achieve that the majority be able to perform works requiring high qualifications in such away that they could continuously adopt to the changing requirements of technology’’.

2.3. Requirements and opportunities of value-centered youth education

Beyond the natural requirement of youth education, the former international-level study directed attention to the sparetime activities and habits of young people. It is widely known that the lifestyle of the older and younger generation differssignificantly in traditional societies. After accession to the EU, however, the demands of young people will become dominantfor several reasons. Naturally, in the new situation, it is not sufficient to refer to a greater degree of adventurousness amongyoung people but one has to get to know cultural diversity in harmony with European trends, one condition of this based onthe opinion of young people is communication between cultures which can be catalyzed by learning foreign languages.

Table 1

Tendency in the pessimistic youth attitude in different cultures.

P. Molnar, Z. Vass / Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61 S59

Based on current opinion, the free time available for young people is still very small in international comparison, which isrelated to a greater degree of polarization in societal strata. Free time as regenerating activity makes only sense in relation towork. According to the results of the interviews, low-educated women or women with families entering the workforce at anearly age have problems of free time, as well. As opposed to this, among young people who do not want to study or work, i.e.their interest cannot be aroused, we have experienced that they cannot find a meaningful activity in their free time.

Another additive in comparison to topics mentioned before: young people are too tough they have no respect, whoeverwants to achieve something in life, he will achieve it, they are helped by stipends and application opportunities. The nextgeneration, today’s 10 year olds will enjoy the benefits of the EU.

2.4. Proposal for a generational contract acceptable by everybody

In 1985, we did not find in Hungary the generational conflicts mentioned based on Hungarian reality and Westernliterature. Not even the present interviews support the theory of generational conflict, although young people refer to someof its symptoms. One must not confuse the student revolts in 68 with the individualization events in Hungary in the pastdecades, or the Western youth groups that have become diverse in an explosive process. The question of what youth groupsare present in Hungary appeared in the study but as opposed to the news in the press, we did not find answers worthmentioning.

Nevertheless, the practical significance of a subjective, increasingly pluralistic society and an economic globalization hasincreased in both Western and Eastern Europe as opposed to the monolithic dominant role of the earlier class and layerstructure. The same can be said about the changing role of family, religion, youth groups and one party system.

Although this question occupies a central position in our interest, but we have not formulated as harshly as in Germany:‘‘There is no welfare without children’’ (Handelsblatt 13.11.2003). Demographic processes direct attention to the dangersthat the opposition of interest between younger and older people is not disappearing and the aging process in society isbecoming increasingly dramatic. The expected disproportionate change in the ratio of younger and older people affects thewhole European continent. As a result, although lacking in our public life, the so-called generational contract was introduced

Table 2

German and Hungarian university student’s attitude.

Date Future orientation scale (pessimistic pole = +)

Youth centrism Accommodation Self actualization Privatization

Hungarian

1985 repr +0.15* +0.19** +0.01 �0.13

1989 +0.18** �0.02 +0.05 �0.01

1996 +0.23* +0.13 +0.17 +0.13

1998 +0.04 �0.07 �0.14 +0.06

2000 +0.23 +0.33** +0.03 +0.11

2004 +0.47** +0.25 �0.06 +0.20

2004 repr. No data �0.03 �0.45** �0.27**

German

1984 +0.24*** �0.18*** +0.33*** �0.17***

1992 +0.25** �0.20* +0.27** �0.29**

1996 +0.30*** �0.16 �0.19* �0.23**

* Significance level = 0.05.

** Significance level = 0.01.

*** Significance level = 0.001.

Table 3

Political interest among 20–24 years youth according to the temporary well being and future orientation.

P. Molnar, Z. Vass / Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61S60

in Europe. The point is that actual conflicts of interest are arising between younger and older people. The true question in aninternational comparative study is whether the political changes have accelerated or decelerated this process?

3. Results

3.1. The changes of Hungarian and German youth future orientation from 1985 till 2004

The data collected in 1985 indicates a 15–30 year period delay comparing the common process to the German youth. Inspite of the mentioned fact, there are common features as well. As a result of the accelerated social and economical changeswe can find common tendencies in the collected data in 1989. The data collected in 2004 are really convincible to drop thecommon convergence hypothesis (Table 1).

In Table 2, we summarize the changes of the content of the future orientation. Regarding the question: Does theHungarian youth attitude follow the western civilizations process? On the basis of the time series data the meaning of thefuture orientation represents the traditional accommodation process (+19). This phenomenon indicates that the pessimisticuniversity students accept the environmental requirements in passive way. While the optimistic youth refuse theacceptance of the real social events.

3.2. The content of the optimistic youth attitude in 2004

The data collected in 204 can be used to draw a very careful conclusion about the changes of the common process which hasbeen found on the basis of the time series Shell studies data. According to that, the Hungarian youth among the universitystudents have a very optimistic attitude which has not been found (73%). The detailed analysis is out of the aim of this paper buthere are the two tables to simply demonstrate the main findings. First of all in Hungary the optimistic youth attitude can becharacterized by competitive attitude which is in temporary connection with the well-being and the political interest (Table 3).

Table 4

The planned number of the children among 20–24 years youth according to the temporary well being and future orientation.

P. Molnar, Z. Vass / Futures 45 (2013) S55–S61 S61

As we can see this kind of individualism is not supporting the sustainable development on the political field.In Table 4 we can see that the number of planned children does not belong to the long term optimism as one would expect

it otherwise it belongs to temporary well being state. It can be known that there are not enough children to keep thesustainable development.

Instead of the answer to the opened questions I quote the detailed conclusion of the main findings. From the youth age tothe adult life, the transition process has been longer from the 50s till 80s. Its effect that the cultural knowledge created anadvanced filed to the individualization processes. This is what Mead argued in her theory. The other conclusion can be drawnthat the university students react in a very sensitive way to the dramatic social changes which can be seen in the collecteddata.

Unfortunately at the historical changes (political system change in Hungary) the content of the youth future orientationattitude has been changed, indicating that in the 90s this attitude could be characterized as an accommodation to thechanges as a result of the peripheral position.

References

[1] S.W. Hawking, A Brief History of Time from the Big Bang to Black Holes, Bantam Books, Toronto; New York, 1988.[2] J.E. Nurmi, How do Adolescents see and create their future, in: The 6th Biennial Conference of the European Association for Research on Adolescence,

Budapest, 1998.[3] A. Fischer, W. Fuchs, J. Zinnecker, Jugendliche und Erwachsene’85; Kohorten im Vergleich Band 5, in: 10. Shell Jugendstudie Leske +Budrich Opladen, 1985.[4] M. Mead, Culture and Commitment. The New Relationships between the Generations in the 1970s, New York, Hardcover, Columbia University Press, 1978.[5] P. Molnar, Fiatalok tarsadalmi integralodasanak tıpusai a civilizacios valtozasok tukreben Kalokagathia 1996/1, Magyar Testnevelesi Egyetem 3-22 old.[6] P. Molnar, J. Zinnecker, Ifjusagi eletutak osszehasonlıto elemzese, Tarsadalomtudomanyi Kozlemenyek, 1988/4, sz. 580–588. p. Comparative study of youth

biography, integrations type of youth and civilizations changes.[7] M. Watts, J. Zinnecker, Youth Culture and Politics among German Youth: Effect of Youth Centrism, Amsterdam, 1988.[8] L. Rosenmayr, Die menschlichen Lebensalter, Rosenmayr Leopold (hrsg. von), Die menschlichen Lebensalter, Munchen-Zurich, 1978.[9] H. Schelsky, Die skeptische Generation Eine Soziologie der deutschen Jugend, Eugen Diederichs Verlag Dusseldorf, Koln, 1957.

[10] R.K. Silbereisen, L.A. Vaskovic, J. Zinnecker, Jungsein in Deutschland Jugendliche und junge Erwachsene 1991 und 1996 Leske +Budrich Opladen, 1996.[11] J.E. Nurmi, How do adolescents see their future? A review of the development of future-orientation and planning, Developmental Review 11 (1998) 1–59, 2

pp..[12] F. Rheinberg, Motivation, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart, 1997.[13] E.H. Erikson, Identity, Youth and Crises, Norton, New York, 1974.[14] Jugendwerk d. Dt. Shell, Jugend-81: Lebensentwurfe, Alltagskulturen, Zukunftsbilder (Gesamtkonzeption d. Studie: A. Fischer), Hamburg, 1981.