Is Gen Z Losing Trust, or Missing the Practice It Takes to Build It?

Is Gen Z Losing Trust, or Missing the Practice It Takes to Build It?

When I used to speak at student assemblies, I would talk about two basic ways people approach trust. Some people trust someone up front, then hope that trust grows over time. If the other person proves to be untrustworthy, they adjust. Other people begin more cautiously. They meet someone, observe them and allow trust to build as it is earned.

I have always been a fairly trusting person. When I think back to childhood, I cannot clearly remember how I evaluated the adults in my life. I certainly did not trust every adult equally, but I also do not remember moving through the world assuming that most adults were dangerous, dishonest or trying to manipulate me.

As I grew older, I became more aware of whom I could trust and how much I could trust them. That awareness developed through time, experience and practice. I learned that someone could be trustworthy in one area and unreliable in another. I learned that people sometimes make mistakes without being bad people. I also learned that some people should be kept at a distance.

When I found someone to be untrustworthy, I usually avoided them when possible. If I had to interact with them, I took what they said at a more superficial level and moved on. Sometimes my judgment was accurate. Sometimes I got burned.

That is part of learning how relationships work.

Trust Takes Practice

We sometimes talk about trust as if it is simply a feeling. Either you trust someone or you do not. In reality, trust is also a skill that develops through repeated human interaction.

We learn trust by spending time with people. We watch whether their words match their actions. We notice whether they respect boundaries, keep promises, admit mistakes and show up when we need them. We learn how to recognize the difference between someone having a bad day and someone showing us a consistent pattern.

Social skills develop in much the same way. We practice reading facial expressions, noticing changes in tone and recognizing when someone is uncomfortable. We learn how to apologize, forgive, compromise and repair a relationship after something goes wrong.

Some of this involves intuition, that feeling we sometimes get about another person even when we cannot explain it. Intuition can help guide us, but intuition is also shaped by experience. The more time we spend navigating different people and situations, the more information our brains have to work with.

Repetition helps us become better at deciding when to step closer, when to slow down and when to walk away.

Gen Z’s Trust Looks Very Different

I recently came across an analysis by Ryan Burge using data from the General Social Survey. The survey asks a fairly simple question:

“Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you can’t be too careful in dealing with people?”

The generational differences are striking. According to Burge’s analysis, only 13 percent of Gen Z respondents said that most people can be trusted. That compares with 24 percent of Millennials and approximately 30 percent of Gen X. He also found that 74 percent of Gen Z respondents said people cannot be trusted.

Gen Z began with lower levels of trust than previous generations, and its level of trust appears to have continued falling. In 2018, slightly more than 20 percent said most people could be trusted. In the most recent data, that number fell into the single digits during some survey years.

As Burge writes, unless something changes significantly, Gen Z could become the least trusting generation in modern American history. You can read his full analysis in Gen Z Doesn’t Trust Anyone.

The data tells us what Gen Z respondents reported, but it does not give us one simple explanation for why they feel this way. There are probably many factors involved, including anxiety, political division, the pandemic, economic uncertainty, institutional failures and constant exposure to the worst parts of human behavior online.

Still, the findings made me wonder about something closer to my counselor roots.

What if part of the problem is a lack of practice?

Has Avoidance Replaced Relationship Repair?

Previous generations did not necessarily have healthier relationships or better social skills. We had plenty of conflict, cruelty, dishonesty and broken relationships. We also did not have as many ways to escape an uncomfortable interaction without dealing with it.

If you had a disagreement with a friend at school, you probably saw that person again the next morning. If you argued with someone in your neighborhood, they might still show up later to ride bikes, play basketball or hang out. You could avoid someone for a while, but eventually you had to figure out how to exist in the same physical space.

Those situations were uncomfortable, but they gave us practice.

We learned that an argument did not always mean the friendship was over. We learned that people sometimes say things they regret. We learned how to approach someone after a conflict, explain why we were hurt and listen to their side. Sometimes the relationship was repaired. Sometimes it ended. Either way, we gained experience.

Young people today have tools that make avoidance much easier. They can ghost someone, leave a group chat, block an account, mute a conversation or disappear without explaining why. Sometimes those tools are necessary for safety. Blocking someone who is threatening, abusive or repeatedly violating boundaries can be a healthy response.

The problem comes when the same tools are used to escape every uncomfortable feeling.

There is a difference between protecting yourself from harm and avoiding a difficult conversation. There is also a difference between a dangerous relationship and an imperfect one. If every disagreement is considered toxic, every uncomfortable comment is treated as a red flag and every mistake leads to immediate removal, young people lose opportunities to practice relationship repair.

You cannot learn to work through conflict if you leave at the first sign of it.

Connected to Everyone, Close to Almost No One

Gen Z has more ways to reach other people than any generation before it. Young people can connect through social media, messaging, gaming platforms, video calls, dating apps and online communities. They can communicate with someone across the world in seconds.

Yet many still report feeling deeply lonely.

That apparent contradiction makes more sense when we recognize that access is not the same as connection. Knowing what someone posted today does not mean knowing that person. Having hundreds of followers does not guarantee that you have someone you can call when your life begins falling apart.

A device can provide contact, but contact alone does not build trust. Trust develops through consistency, vulnerability, shared experiences and the gradual discovery that another person will remain present even when the interaction becomes uncomfortable.

Dating offers another example. Young adults have access to more potential partners than any previous generation, yet many are dating less. Dating apps can make people appear replaceable. If one conversation becomes awkward or one date does not create an immediate spark, another profile is waiting one swipe away.

Young people may also be entering these interactions with little trust to begin with. They expect to be ghosted, lied to, used, embarrassed or rejected. When something goes wrong, it confirms what they already believed.

The cycle then reinforces itself. Distrust leads to distance, distance prevents meaningful connection and the lack of meaningful connection makes the world feel even less trustworthy.

Are Young People Getting Burned and Giving Up?

In my opinion, many of them are.

They may enter relationships cautiously, experience disappointment and step back before they have enough practice to understand what happened. They may struggle to tell the difference between normal human imperfection and a genuine warning sign.

Social media does not always help. Online advice often reduces complicated relationships to simple labels. Someone is a narcissist. A friend is toxic. A partner is manipulative. A disagreement becomes gaslighting. A mistake becomes proof of someone’s true character.

Those terms describe real behaviors and can help people recognize unhealthy situations. However, when we apply them too quickly, they can eliminate the possibility of context, conversation, accountability and growth.

Real relationships are messy because people are messy. We misunderstand each other. We become defensive. We communicate poorly. We occasionally disappoint people we care about.

Healthy relationships are not relationships without conflict. They are relationships in which people can address conflict, take responsibility and work toward repair.

If young people never practice those uncomfortable conversations, they may begin to see avoidance as their only form of self protection. Unfortunately, avoiding pain also limits their opportunities to experience closeness.

How Adults Can Help Young People Practice Trust

Parents, teachers, counselors and other trusted adults cannot force young people to trust. We can, however, give them safer opportunities to practice the skills that make trust possible.

Let them work through manageable conflict

Adults often want to step in and fix social problems quickly. Sometimes intervention is necessary, especially when there is bullying, harassment, abuse or a significant power imbalance. Other times, young people need coaching instead of rescue.

Help them think through what they want to say. Ask what happened, how they interpreted it and whether another explanation might be possible. Encourage a direct conversation when it is emotionally and physically safe.

Teach the difference between discomfort and danger

Feeling awkward, embarrassed, disappointed or nervous does not always mean a situation is unsafe. Young people need help recognizing the difference between normal relationship discomfort and behavior that is threatening, controlling or abusive.

If we treat every uncomfortable interaction as something to escape, we unintentionally teach young people that they cannot handle difficult emotions.

Model honest repair

Adults make mistakes with young people. We lose patience, misunderstand what they are telling us or respond too quickly. Those moments give us an opportunity to model what repair looks like.

A sincere apology shows a young person that trust does not require perfection. It requires honesty, responsibility and a willingness to do better.

Avoid demanding immediate trust

Saying “You can trust me” does not create trust. Our behavior does.

Young people notice whether we listen, protect their privacy, follow through and remain calm when they tell us something difficult. Trust grows when our responses consistently show that we are safe, dependable and honest.

Encourage face-to-face conversations

Not every serious conversation should happen through text. Written messages remove tone, facial expression and immediate clarification. They make it easier to misunderstand someone and easier to walk away.

Encourage young people to have important conversations in person when possible, or at least through a phone or video call. The goal is not to remove technology, but to help them choose a form of communication that supports understanding.

Help them evaluate patterns instead of isolated moments

One bad interaction does not always define a person. At the same time, repeated dishonesty, disrespect or boundary violations should not be ignored.

Teach young people to look for patterns. Does this person usually follow through? Do they take responsibility when they cause harm? Do they respect “no”? Can they handle disagreement without becoming cruel or threatening?

Those questions are more useful than simply asking whether someone feels trustworthy in a single moment.

Create more opportunities for real interaction

Young people need places where they can spend time together without every interaction being performed, recorded or posted. Teams, clubs, volunteer work, community programs, faith communities and informal gatherings all provide opportunities to cooperate, disagree, solve problems and get to know people over time.

Human connection grows through shared experience. It is difficult to build deep trust through profiles and posts alone.

Stepping Forward Instead of Back

I do not believe Gen Z is incapable of trusting or connecting. I believe many young people have grown up in an environment that constantly warns them to be careful while giving them fewer opportunities to practice what healthy trust looks like.

They see scams, cruelty, public shaming, edited images, misinformation and relationships falling apart in real time. Their caution did not appear out of nowhere. Some of it is understandable and protective.

But caution without connection can become isolation.

Young people still need practice talking through hard things, sitting with discomfort, apologizing, forgiving and deciding when a relationship can be repaired. They also need practice recognizing when someone is truly unsafe and walking away without guilt.

Our role is not to tell them to trust everyone. It is to help them develop the judgment, confidence and experience to know whom they can trust, how much they can trust them and what to do when that trust is broken.

The devices in their hands may help them find one another, but only human interaction can teach them how to stay connected. If we want young people to feel less lonely, we need to help them step forward into relationships, not simply disappear when those relationships become difficult.

Behind every account, every message, every disagreement and every uncomfortable conversation is a human being who is still learning how to connect.

More Than a Profile.

Ryan