^ agree with all the points above. I've been a University professor for the past 7 years, and over the years, I've noticed a considerable difference in the level of sincerity that students exhibit towards learning, and the level of respect they confer to their teachers as well as their peers. Sometimes I feel that I’m falling prey to the same tendency when my elders used to say “in our times, we used to…” – but I’m not even that far apart from my students in terms of age – so it’s not even a matter of generation gap per say – or so I’d like to think.
To relate to njgal’s point about intellectual conversations, there are a few tangible observations that I have made over my last few years of interacting with students year after year. I believe that the convenience afforded by new technologies and tools has resulted in their relaxed and often careless work ethic. I’m not saying that technologies are to blame… the relaxed aptitude and over-reliance on superficial information is just a symptom of not using technologies effectively. For example, most students are too dependent on Google and Wikipedia… which is okay as a starting point for research, but they don’t even use those tools effectively… and rarely follow it up with additional resources to do more research. In my classes I refer to this behavior as heuristic processing of information, i.e. depending too much on obvious, tip of the iceberg information, and primarily relying on technology cues to decipher what information is relevant. The opposite behavior which I require from students is what I call systematic processing of information where someone takes the time to think through the problem, devise a plan and approach their tasks more methodically with an analytical mindset.
On the other point about respect and decorum - again, in my opinion, it’s the disproportionate preference for the corporeal over the ethereal that makes youth discourteous towards their colleagues. Their perceptions are dominated by commercialism, and they see everyone’s role in terms of material exchanges. As a professor, it’s my job and I get paid for what I do… so they are simply my customers and I’m providing a service to them, and beyond that relationship, there’s little deference that needs to be afforded to me. Again, I’m not saying every student is like this… but many are.
In the end, a lot of it actually boils down to what redvelvet said about parental upbringing and the atmosphere at home. It is very easy for me to identify the type of rearing an individual has had at home when I talk to them. I also agree that you can’t always expect rational behavior from teens, but once someone is in their early 20s, things ought to be a little different… a little more serious… and that’s the time when you can really tell whether the irrational, careless, and disrespectful behavior in the teen years was just an aberration, or a lasting personality trait.
I have got years of experience in the software industry and have watched each year as campus graduates join the company. I have seen a marked difference in the attitude with each passing batch. When I joined the industry, boss was God to us. Disagreeing with him had its own ramifications. It is not like that these days. Campus graduates question decisions and it is difficult to get a buy in from them. It is difficult to get them to work on weekends and for extended hours. The positive aspect is that these guys understand what is good for them and take decisions appropriately. They work hard when it is required and are smart. They are fast and at times am amazed by the productivity. There are odd ones out, but there were these losers in any generation. Hence I think it is wrong to make a generalisation.