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Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Generation Jones

I had honestly never heard of this until a reader pointed it out -- but those born in 1961 do not consider themselves Boomers or Gen Xers, so the term Generation Jones has been created to describe them. And, oh yeah, this includes Barack Obama.

Nationwide, those who are exact same age as Obama
say they are GenJonesers, not Boomers or Xers

A new poll released today, of a nationally representative sample of 500 U.S. adults born in 1961—the same year Obama was born—shows that today’s 47 year olds clearly feel not like Boomers nor Gen Xers, but instead believe they belong to the heretofore lost generation in-between Boomers and Xers…Generation Jones. ThirdAge, a popular website for mid-lifers, commissioned the poll, in conjunction with Obama’s Aug. 4, 2008 birthday. When respondents were asked which generation they believe they are a part of: 57% chose Generation Jones, while only 22% picked Baby Boomer, and only 21% said Generation X. ThirdAge, a site that is known for prioritizing consumer insight about its audience, has used this insight to build one of the most popular mid-lifer websites, with over 500,000 unique visitors a month. The underlying concept for the poll was that rather than focusing on expert opinion to determine the question of Obama’s generational identity, a very effective way of answering this question is to ask the actual people born in 1961 to self-identify their generation.


Question:

500 U.S. adults born in 1961 were asked:

“Do you consider yourself to be a member of the Baby Boom Generation,
Generation X, or a lost generation in-between (usually called Generation Jones)?”

Results:

22% chose: Baby Boom Generation
57% chose: Generation Jones
21% chose: Generation X

ThirdAge commissioned this polling of a nationally representative sample of 500 U.S. adults born in 1961, conducted July 31- August 1, 2008. The polling was conducted by MarketTools, using TrueSample technology, which has recently emerged as a top U.S. polling firm, with a long list of Fortune500 company clients.

The page linked to above has all this and much much more on Gen Jones.


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3 comments:

  1. AnonymousNovember 18, 2008 at 3:21 PM

    Thanks for the info--and the link love to the Gen X post. I appreciate it. Like you, this Generation Jones info is new to me...most curious.

    Karen

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousNovember 19, 2008 at 6:34 PM

    Does anyone actually identify with some abitrarily defined "generation"?

    I was born in 1952. I don't identify with a concept called "the boomers". Should I? Am I missing somethng?

    This post has me worried: Am I missing something?

    Please enlighten me about this generational identification thing. I must be missing something.

    Is it a requirement?

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2009 at 5:33 PM

    For at least three decades I have noticed that it was the early "Boomers" who seemed to receive much mass media attention.

    When the media looks back upon the Boomer's earlier years I see draft card burning, hippies running amok during the 1967 Summer of Love and the anti-Vietnam protests among other events that the EARLY Boomers were involved with.

    Us "middle" and "late" Boomers who "came of age" in the 1970s seem to be the "forgotten" Boomers.

    Sure, we witnessed the antics of the early Boomers and were affected by those events but our participation in the "larger world" occurred in a different era, a post-Vietnam era.

    One impression I possess is that the events of the early Boomer era were more of a fad for the early Boomers while us middle and late Boomers were "forged within the fire" of those early Boomer events.

    Yes, Virginia, I am one middle Boomer who believes there IS a general difference between the early Boomers and us middle and late Boomers who are now being labeled by some as Generation Jones.

    Perhaps the early Boomers could be labeled the "Woodstock Generation" since they were of the age that they could have attended Woodstock without the limitations imposed upon youth such as curfew laws, parental interference, etc.

    Maybe the "Forrest Gump Generation" would fit since Forrest is of the age to fit in those early Boomer years.

    http://obbop.wordpress.com/

    ReplyDelete