Puerto Ricans – Generational Similarities & Differences In Search For Meaning Of Life.

Puerto Rico’s Echo Boomers and Baby Boomers may have more in common than they realize: asked to give each other just one piece of advice, both generations said to “enjoy life.” They also both count AIDS among the most significant, perspective-changing phenomena they have witnessed in their lifetimes.

These are just a sample of the insights produced by Generations & Gaps, Euro RSCG’s global study of the world’s two most powerful generations: the Baby Boomers (made up of two generational cohorts: the Core Boomers and Cuspers) and the Echo Boomers.

“Around the world, Baby Boomers enjoy unique political and financial clout, as well as a well-deserved reputation for political activism and social awareness,” notes Franco Sotomayor, chief executive officer of Premier Euro RSCG, the local agency that is part of Euro RSCG’s global network. “Now, their children-members of the open-minded, tolerant Echo Boom-are ready to assume a more prominent role in society. This study goes beyond prevailing cultural stereotypes, inquiring deeply into the aspirations, fears, and opinions of each generation.”

A global study, Generations & Gaps included respondents from North and South America, Asia Pacific, and Europe. Information was sought on a variety of topics, including sociopolitical views, sexuality, spirituality, family, consumption habits, and more. The findings are drawn from a comparison of four key age groups:

Among the key insights for Puerto Rico:

MORAL MORASS?: It’s not unusual to hear older generations bemoan the loose morals and other perceived deficiencies of youth. One of the surprising findings of Euro RSCG’s study was that it’s the young people themselves who are actually more likely to agree that the morality of young people in their country has gotten worse over the course of their lifetime. This tendency was highly pronounced in Puerto Rico, where 85% of Echo Boomers and 69% of Baby Boomers agreed with the statement.

LUXURY BRINGS STATUS…BUT SO DOES THRIFT: Artificially inflating, or deflating, the purchase price of a product to friends or colleagues is one indication that a consumer is shopping for status. In Puerto Rico, this practice was most prevalent among Echo Boomers: nearly one in three (31%) admitted that they had either exaggerated or minimized a price paid at one time or another. (In contrast, just 10% of Gen Xers said they had done so.) An interesting contrast appeared among the Baby Boomers: although only 5% of Cuspers had ever inflated a price, 25% had deflated it. Similarly, none of the Core Boomers said they had ever exaggerated a price, but 12% had adjusted it down, indicating that older generations are more likely to find social status in a reputation for frugality rather than opulence.

ONE FOR ALL: Around the world, respondents were asked to share the age at which they had reached, or expected to reach, their sexual peak. As a rule, the older the respondent, the higher the peak. In the U.S., for example, the mean age cited by Core Boomers was 46.5, Cuspers said 35.6, and Xers said 34.3, while the Echo Boomers placed one’s sexual peak at 33.3. That’s a 13-year difference between the Core Boomer and Echo Boomer responses. In Puerto Rico, in contrast, each of the four generational cohorts cited similar sexual peaks, with a mean age of 41.1. Their responses ranged from a high of 42.8 among Core Boomers to a low of 38.5 among the Echo Boomers-a difference of just over four years.

PATRIOTISM ON THE RISE: While just 40% of Baby Boomers (48% Core, 30% Cusper) said they consider themselves “patriotic,” fully 61.5% of Echo Boomers felt this way. This stands in sharp contrast to the U.S., where Echo Boomers were less patriotic than Baby Boomers (48% vs. 57%). [Note: Generations & Gaps was fielded prior to the terrorist attacks of 11 September. Levels of patriotism in the U.S. appear to have risen since then.]

METHODOLOGY

Generations & Gaps surveyed more than 2,300 respondents aged 18-56 in more than two dozen countries via online polls conducted by InsightExpress, a Web-based research firm. In addition, 200 self-administered surveys of Baby Boomers and Echo Boomers were collected to add qualitative richness to the findings. The Puerto Ricans surveyed in the study represented a significant sample, which made possible to analyze the results for Puerto Rico as an independent market.