Gen-Zers have become the first generation since records began to be less intelligent than their parents, and an expert has uncovered the reason.
Dr Jared Cooney Horvath, a former teacher-turned-neuroscientist, revealed that the generation born between 1997 and the early 2010s has been cognitively stunted by their over-reliance on digital technology in school.
Since records have been kept on cognitive development in the late 1800s, Gen Z is now officially the first group to ever score lower than the generation before them, declining in attention, memory, reading and math skills, problem-solving abilities, and overall IQ.
Horvath told the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation that Gen Z intelligence dropped despite these teenagers and young adults spending more time in school than children did in the 20th century.
The cause, Horvath claimed, is directly tied to the increase in the amount of learning that is now carried out using what he called ‘educational technology’ or EdTech, which includes computers and tablets.
The neuroscientist explained that this generation has fallen behind because the human brain was never wired to learn from short clips seen online and reading brief sentences that sum up much larger books and complex ideas.
‘More than half of the time a teenager is awake, half of it is spent staring at a screen,’ Horvath told the New York Post.
‘Humans are biologically programmed to learn from other humans and from deep study, not flipping through screens for bullet point summaries.’
Gen Z, born approximately between 1997 and 2010, grew up during the age when digital devices were widely distributed in schools worldwide (stock image)
Horvath and other experts speaking to Congress explained that humans evolved to learn best through real human interaction, meaning face-to-face with teachers and peers, not from screens.
He added that screens disrupt the natural biological processes that build deep understanding, memory, and focus.
It is not about poor implementation, inadequate training or the need for better apps in schools. Scientists said the technology itself was mismatched with how our brains naturally work, grow and retain information.
Horvath, the director of LME Global, a group that shares brain and behavioral research with businesses and schools, said that data clearly show that cognitive abilities began to plateau and even decline around 2010.
The expert told senators that schools in general hadn’t changed much that year, and that human biology evolves too slowly for it to have been the reason.
‘The answer appears to be the tools we are using within schools to drive that learning,’ Horvath told lawmakers on January 15.
‘If you look at the data, once countries adopt digital technology widely in schools, performance goes down significantly.’
He added that the US wasn’t the only country affected by digital cognitive decline, noting that his research covered 80 countries and showed a six-decade trend of poorer learning outcomes as more tech entered classrooms.
Dr Jared Cooney Horvath (Pictured) revealed during a US Senate hearing that Gen Zers have become the first group in history to have a lower IQ than their parents
Moreover, kids using computers for just five hours a day specifically for their schoolwork scored noticeably lower than those who rarely or never used tech in class.
In the US, data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) uncovered that when states rolled out widespread one-to-one device programs, meaning each student gets their own device, scores often flattened or dropped quickly.
While centuries of data have shown that Gen Z has fallen off the path of constant human development, Horvath claimed that many teens and young adults were unaware of their struggles and were actually proud of their alleged intelligence.
‘Most of these young people are overconfident about how smart they are. The smarter people think they are, the dumber they actually are,’ he told the Post.
He noted that Gen Z has become so comfortable with consuming information outside of class through short, attention-escaping sentences and video clips, on platforms such as TikTok, that many schools have given in and now teach in this same manner.
‘What do kids do on computers? They skim. So rather than determining what do we want our children to do and gearing education towards that, we are redefining education to better suit the tool. That’s not progress, that is surrender,’ Horvath warned.
Education experts at the January hearing recommended imposing delays on giving children smartphones, bringing back flip phones instead for young children when needed, and taking nationwide action to normalize limits on tech in schools.
The group called the issue plaguing Gen Z a ‘societal emergency,’ and urged federal lawmakers to consider models like Scandinavia’s EdTech bans.
