The lost art of small talk: A Gen Z perspective

What happens to a generation when our communication skills are deteriorating?

It was a sunny day in Longport, NJ. The very end of the spring season, when the 60-degree weather is crisp against your face but days at the beach are soon in reach. My mom and I are walking on our block, and we pass a neighbor across the street who we vaguely know. 

My mom pauses. “Hey, how are you? Beautiful day, right?”

The neighbor responds, and small talk ensues. 

“Alright, have a good day!” We walk along.

I turn to my mom and joke, “You know, I don’t know how I am going to be an adult with neighbors one day. If I saw someone I barely knew, I would probably look away and walk extra fast to avoid the awkward small talk.”

She laughs, and responds, “You’ll learn one day.”

I thought about it. Will I learn one day? Obviously I was being facetious to my mom, but I have noticed that me and all my peers are egregiously sub-par at small talk. We can do it when we absolutely need to, but we really aren't that great at it. Since going to college and transitioning into adulthood, I have started to realize this more and more. And what else is to blame than the thing that most of my generation's problems stem from? Our phones. 

For Gen Z, our phones are attached to us at all times, like a third hand. And luckily for us, this device can give us entertainment at every moment of the day. Sitting in a waiting room for a doctor’s appointment? Scroll on Instagram. Traveling on a bus? Go on TikTok. Waiting for class to start? Check your Snapchat 

Sure, this gives us a little boost of dopamine to get through these menial moments of life, but our screen time replaces moments where we may have spoken to someone in the past. Particularly in a college classroom setting, those valuable five minutes before the professor begins lecture could be a great time to meet other people and make friends. However, if you go into certain college classrooms today, you might encounter the dystopian setting of a group of teenagers sitting with their heads down on their phones or laptops. 

Moreover, this digital fixation isn’t just reserved for sedentary times. I often find that when I am walking anywhere, the second me and another teenager notice each other, we both jump to look at our phones. It is like some primal instinct is telling us to avoid any human contact. The days of the close-mouthed smile of acknowledgment are dwindling, people. 

One could rebut that maybe only skilled small-talkers could master conversations with complete strangers, like in the scenarios I outlined above. However, this phenomenon occurs even with me and my closest friends. It feels like whenever the conversation dies down a little and no one knows what to say immediately, everyone just grabs their phones. Writing out what actually happens sounds unrealistic and weird, but it feels so normal to do in the moment. I could be talking with a friend on the C1 (Duke people will get it 😉), and inevitably the conversation will transition to us on our phones, acting like two toddlers transfixed by Peppa Pig. The reliance on phones to fill bouts of silence happens with almost everyone, whether they are your friend or not. 

Sometimes I imagine myself looking at me and my friends from an outside perspective, sitting together but all on our phones, and I get really sad. It feels like our quality time together just gets degraded by the instinct to check social media, and that instinct was drilled in us by our Internet socialization. It is like second nature at this point. 

I want to pull back on my sweeping generalization for a moment. Yes, my generation is not a monolith, and some suave talkers are sidestepping this problem. Maybe I am biased with some of my social anxiety tendencies. However, this is a large enough problem and it is worth discussing. What happens to a generation when our communication skills are deteriorating? 

Experts have declared that we are facing a mental health crisis. Specifically in youth mental health, data has shown that 42% of high school students in 2021 “experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness,” up from 28% in 2011. And 22% “seriously considered attempting suicide,” up from 16% in 2011. 

Anxiety is a major component of that poor mental health cocktail, and that anxiety could be a main factor making us feel less confident in socializing with others. It becomes this feedback loop: we go on our phones instead of enduring the awkwardness of socializing, but because we lack that practice we become anxious to socialize, therefore we go on our phones more and the cycle repeats. 

Our rusty communication skills affect us in all aspects of our lives. We may be less confident at job interviews, public speaking, and meeting new people. We may isolate ourselves because our anxiety prevents us from facing the awkwardness that comes from existing in the real world. We may be less willing to put ourselves out there and experience new things. Our sense of community, from neighborhoods to classrooms, could be stilted if we do not want to talk to each other. 

I don’t blame myself or my peers for this behavior. We were handed phones at a young age, primarily for the safety reasons of being able to communicate with our parents, and from then on technology was a major influence on our development. Now, phones have become integrated into our lives, helping us in so many ways, and making it nearly impossible to go off the grid. 

While we are products of our environment, we are not powerless to make any changes. It starts with something small. For example, at my friend’s birthday dinner, we all put our phones in a pile to prevent us from looking at them. It definitely made a difference in being more present. 

Overall, what makes us human is our sociability – and this is coming from an introvert. Let’s not lose that special quality because of hunks of metal.