1. dia

1
Pessimistic Futures Generation for Pessimistic
Future Generations ?
The Youth has the Future but the Olders has the
authority
Semmelweis University, Budapest Deprtament of
Psychology
Péter Molnár Ph.D.
Zoltán Vass Ph.D.
molnarp_at_mail.hupe.hu
zoltanvassphd_at_yahoo.com
WFSF 2005
2
The structure of the presentation

• The Shell Youth Studies 1981-2005

Optimistic Youth Attitude
Pessimistic Youth Attitude
Their effect on the Society (Political interest)

• The demographical conditions of the sustainable
  Development

Optimistic Youth Attitude
More children
3

• Radical changes in the meaning of Future and
  future generations

Chaos theory and its application to the society
The relation between the individuals, generations
and the population in this changing, dynamic world
The interpretation of Self-organizing,
determinism and normative future
These are principles of nonlinear dynamic
systems, and they concern problems of emergent
order and complexity how structure and patterns
arise from the cooperation of many individual
parts.

• What are the main differences between the
  optimistic and pessimistic
• youth behavior?
• How do they relate to each other?

4
1. Shell Youth studies (Pessimistic attitude)
How does the optimistic and pessimistic behavior
reflects to the radical changes in the society?
Political system change in Hungary
Reunification of West and East Germany
5
2. The relation between demography and the
sustainable development
In Hungary, the condition of young people is
fundamentally influenced by demographic processes
and opportunities for employment.
Demographic processes direct attention to the
dangers that the opposition of interest between
younger and older people is not disappearing and
the aging process in society is becoming
increasingly dramatic. The expected
disproportionate change in the ratio of younger
and older people affects the whole European
continent. As a result, a though lacking in our
public life, the so-called generational contract
was introduced in Europe. The point is that
actual conflicts of interest are arising between
younger and older people. The true question in
an international comparative study is whether the
political changes have accelerated or decelerated
this process?
6
Hungarian youth (20-24) behavior reflects to the
close future not to the far future
Optimistic/pessimistic behavior and the children
Politics and future
Collective variables in the dynamic system
Satisfaction in the present and children
7
3. Application of the dynamic systems approach to
the society, (defining terms)
Micro level, macro level, attractors, bifurcation
in open physical systems
Micro level, macro level, attractors, bifurcation
in the society
Control and Order parameters
Stability and instability
8
Results
The future of the Society
Planned number of children actual children
number
Pessimistic
Optimistic
Satisfied low level
Satisfied high level
9
Results
The future of the Society
Are you interested in Politics?
Pessimistic
Optimistic
Satisfied low level
Satisfied high level
10
Results
Political interest
Satisfied 0, 1, 2, 3, children
Unsatisfied 0, 1, 2, 3, children
0, 1, 2, 3, children
11
Conclusions

• Shell studies conclusions fluctuations in the
  pessimistic/optimistic ratio

Maintenance of the far future by the pessimistic
youth and not by the optimistic youth in 1980
The optimistic youth in Hungary do not do and
think more then the pessimistic youth (2005)
12
Conclusions
Optimistic youth attitude
Pessimistic youth attitude
present
future
32,5
54,5
13
Hungarian Youth (20-24) in 2004
The optimistic youth in Hungary do not do and
think more then the pessimistic youth about/for
the future (2005)
13
Open questions
Education or teaching
The next generation will enjoy the benefits of
EU, (todays ten year olds).
The older generation could do more to educate the
youth due to a more valuable future.
Hundelsblatt There is no welfare without
children (Handelsblatt 13.11.2003).
14
The modern youth life style and the increase in
the number of university students are
advantageous for our economic level. We want to
emphasize that, Hungarian youth think about this
process as peripheral participants opposed to
Western Europeans civilization processes. We
have a hypothesis about a common civilization
process in European culture, where this process
in Hungarian society has been retarded. We hope
that in spite of this retardation Hungarian
society can follow the development of
West-European civilization. However, we have
tried to analyze the possibility of different
developmental paths in two countries as well. The
role of Hungarian society has been very important
in the European political field and shares the
same cultural values as the whole of Europe.
Nowadays the question is the same how can
European countries belonging to the EU
collaborate with each other? What does all this
mean from the point of view of the developmental
process of future-orientation? By the evidence
of the article, the civilization theory of
Margaret Mead has proved to be a useful principle
in interpretation for the common European youth
cultural style. Common characteristics can be
found in the social development of German and
Hungarian youth culture and in the relation of
the future-orientation and life feeling of the
youth. Though, 15-20 years retardation can be
pointed to in the opinion of youth, which had
temporarily disappeared in the time of the
political system change. In the 10 year period
following the political system change can be
observed significant difference in the
future-orientation of youth. This article calls
attention to the proper developmental
possibilities of quality of life and to the
danger of their absence. This result shows us the
restricted validity of the unified theory of
civilization.
15
References
Molnár, P., Gerencsér, Á., Vass, Z. Porto The
Hungarian youths opinion about the enlargement
process of EU (focusing on possibilities for
Hungary) IX Conference of the European
Association for Research on Adolescence EARA May
4-8 2004d Porto, Portugal
Jugendwerk der Deutschen Shell (1985)
Generationen im Vergleich Hamburg Mead, M.
(1970) Culture and Commitment. A Study of the
Generation Gap New York Molnár Péter -
Zinnecker, Jürgen (1988) Lebensphase Jugend im
historisch - interkulturellen Vergleich Ungarn
1985 - Westdeutschland 1954 - Westdeutschland
1984 in Jugend im internationalen Vergleich.
Juventa Weinheim München Molnár Péter-Szego
Szilvia Ifjúság tanulás és munka a
munkanélküliség fenyegetettségében Társadalmi
Szemle 1997/1. 15-33 old. Molnár, P. (2004)The
psychological developmental process of
future-orientation and political system change
International Journal of Behavior Development In
press Watts, Meredith W. (1988) Orientations
toward Conventional and Unconventional
Participation among West German Youth. University
of Wisconsin, Zinnecker, J. (1986) Jugend im
Raum gesellschaftlicher Klassen Neue Überlegungen
zu einem alten Thema Juventa Verlag Weinheim
München
Molnár P., Nováky E., Vass Z. (2004) Európai
fiatalok lehetoségei és kihívásai az egységes
Európában Új Ifjúsági Szemle II. évf. 3. sz.
70-90 old.