4.     Collaboration

In distinction from previous generations emerging adults promote and practice collaboration rather than competition wherever they can.   Whether at work, with their friends or in their family, they want their views to be heard and they are most willing to give the views of others a sympathetic hearing.  When faced with a problem they tend to consult with others in the conviction that the more people contribute their ideas about solving the problem the better the solution. 

Take for example the way they purchase an item for sale.  Before they decide to buy it they research this product thoroughly from every possible angle, its price, the reputation of the company which manufactures or sells the desired item, they compare it with alternatives on the market, and they contact the company to see whether it is willing to customize the item to suit their specific need.  But having done all that they will not make the purchase without seeking the advice of their peers and they are more likely to buy an item if their friends have already bought it and found it to meet with their satisfaction.  Emerging adults are less likely to be influenced by the way a product is advertised and rely most often on their peers for deciding to make the purchase.  In this way buying a product is a collaborative process for them.     

At work they are eager to contribute their ideas to the running of the company they work for.  They are most productive when working together with other employees in groups.  They welcome rather than fear the critique of their ideas by other workers and they favour solutions to problems that are the product of collaboration.  To them work is best done as teamwork rather than individually.  Decision making, they feel should be democratic, done from the bottom up rather than from the top down.  This preference often leads to friction with the philosophy of the management in corporations that are hierarchically structured, as most of them tend to be.

They learn best in schools where education is interactive.  They get along with parents more easily in egalitarian families where rules of behaviour are the product of discussions in which they have a say.  They have no problem living at home even after they have been away to university, provided they can access the net at will without supervision in the privacy of their own bedroom.  Ironically, the Internet enables them to stay in touch with other family members while they are away.  But also, because computer technology has created a physical distance in their home between them and their parents and siblings, there is less actual communication happening.

Much of their interaction with their peers occurs on line rather than face to face.  With them they share in a community, in which they can be themselves together with others.  Within this community communication is world wide and instantaneous.  In it tradition and privacy are of lesser value; personal expression, openness and novelty are at a premium.  Since they are aiming to inform rather than impress one another the language of discourse is easygoing, colloquial, concrete and about the most mundane events of their lives.  The whole of it has the flavour of neighbours talking across the fence with one another at the end of the day.  Emerging adults find this virtual reality so much more user friendly than their everyday reality and this may be the primary reason why they spend so much of their time on line.