Young people have reported a severe drop in life satisfaction during the pandemic, as some feel they missed out on rites of passage, a new study has found.
The Australian National University study led by Professor Nicholas Biddle regularly surveyed more than 3500 respondents from January 2020 to April 2022.
Australians aged 18 to 24 experienced the greatest drop in life satisfaction, falling by 0.5 points from 6.8 in January 2020 to an average of 6.3 on a scale of 0 to 10 in April 2022.
Respondents aged 25 to 54 years had a moderate drop, while those aged 55 years and over had no significant decline and some evidence indicated those aged 75 years and over had a small increase in life satisfaction.
"These effects have continued even into 2022," Professor Biddle said.
"It's kind of surprising when you think back to early in COVID, there was a view that this was going to be really damaging for the elderly and from a physical health perspective COVID certainly impacts on older Australians ... more than younger Australians."
Professor Biddle said there were multiple reasons young people have lost satisfaction, such as less social interactions, missing out on cultural rites of passages and losing more work compared to older generations.
"The point is that these things, they're very age specific and if they get interrupted it's not something that can be done next year and so I think those things which were missed have a particular impact on young Australians," he said.
ANU student and bartender Lewis Carmody said he still felt the effects of the pandemic, despite eased restrictions.
"As a young person prior to the pandemic, it's meant to be the best years of our lives, it's when we're meant to be going out and experience life ... I felt robbed of the opportunity to be young," Mr Carmody said.
"I haven't had an opportunity to travel as an adult yet. [I] definitely wanted to go on exchange at some point and I can't do that anymore."
Mr Carmody's part-time job at a bar meant the pandemic hit him harder, as he had no work during lockdown.
"I had to stop working for about four or five months and even after that work was limited. It wasn't good," he said.
Professor Biddle said there has been "some improvement in life satisfaction" since restrictions had been eased but the levels of psychological distress remained higher than levels before the pandemic, making this a long term issue.
"There was still lower levels of life satisfaction, not only in absolute terms but also relative to pre-COVID for young Australians compared to older Australians, so it would appear from our data that not only were the effects large, but they're also kind of long lasting," he said.
Professor Biddle's study also found women suffered an increase in psychological distress and lost more hours of work compared to men. Further groups that suffered were low income and low education groups in addition to Victorians.
"All those are kind of not surprising, but it's important to confirm and show which of these measures were impacted more," Professor Biddle said.
We've made it a whole lot easier for you to have your say. Our new comment platform requires only one log-in to access articles and to join the discussion on The Canberra Times website. Find out how to register so you can enjoy civil, friendly and engaging discussions. See our moderation policy here.
