Gen Z Project Overview
Overview
This project explores how young people aged 18 to 27 view religious and spiritual role models—including religion and spirituality more generally—amidst rapidly changing religious demographics and the increasing digitalisation of social life.
To explore this topic, the project collects story completion submissions and analyses these fictional narratives using reflexive thematic analysis. Themes are conceptualised as narrative-types, with each conveying distinct understandings of religion and spirituality vis-à-vis the influence of an exemplar.
For each narrative-type, an author profile is constructed using data from an accompanying demographic survey, and the analysis itself is refined through participatory research methods. This combination of methods helps verify the claim that participants project themselves into their story completion submissions.
As of 12 January 2025, 128 participants from across the globe submitted a story of at least 200 words, and 52 participants provided feedback on the developing analysis. A description of the project’s analytical themes is offered below, following a presentation of the story stem, i.e., the prompt to which all participants responded.
Story Stem
32 unread messages. Jesse put down the phone, frustrated. How would Jesse get through the next few days? Looking for answers—or distraction—Jesse picked up the phone and started watching videos.
One video caught Jesse's eye. A remarkable individual, talking about something religious or spiritual. Jesse couldn't quite make it out, but Jesse was interested and found something impressive, maybe admirable, about the person.
So, Jesse continued watching and ….
Thematic Analysis
Theme 1: The Divine Disillusionment Narrative
These stories capture frustration with religious institutions, especially around money, sexuality, and gender identity. Jesse starts by admiring a religious figure but soon realises the person is manipulative, using religion for financial gain or promoting exclusionary beliefs. A strong feminist perspective runs through the stories, criticising patriarchal systems and pushing for reform. These stories aren’t anti-religious per se but rather express a desire for institutions to practice what they preach. Equality, inclusion, and integrity matter.
Theme 2: The Space Between Narrative
Here, Jesse navigates life’s uncertainties, caught between belief and unbelief. Sometimes, the space between is comforting—embracing the unknown as in Eastern philosophies. Other times, it’s overwhelming, leading to feelings of chaos or being stuck in a digital loop. Tech, social media, and information overload often add to this uncertainty. But many stories show that peace can be found by accepting life’s ambiguities rather than fighting them.
Theme 3: The Self-help Narrative
Often influencers, not traditional religious figures, take centre stage in these stories. Jesse is inspired by lifestyle gurus promoting personal empowerment and well-being. It’s about practical, everyday enlightenment—managing stress, becoming successful, and achieving calmness. These narratives reflect participants’ interest in self-improvement over traditional spirituality.
Theme 4: The Lost-and-found Narrative
These are hopeful stories where Jesse, feeling lost in the digital chaos, reconnects with people and reality—often through an emotional experience with a religious or spiritual exemplar. Some stories focus on finding God (the religious versions), while others are about reconnecting with family and friends (the spiritual versions). These narratives suggest that while participants struggle with isolation and tech distractions, they crave deeper connections in real life—whether with others, God, or the world around them.
Theme 5: The Simple Faith Narrative
In these stories, Jesse has an immediate emotional or intellectual reaction to something sacred, finding peace or comfort in faith. There’s little internal struggle; the response is swift, whether through feelings of forgiveness or rational clarity. These stories show how deeply embedded faith practices are for many young people, especially those from non-Western cultures. They also highlight the role of technology in connecting participants to both global and local spiritual traditions.
Dataset
The first 100 story completion submissions are available to read at https://portal.sds.ox.ac.uk/Understanding_GenZ.
Funding
This project received generous funding from the John Fell Fund and the UNIQ+ Graduate Access Programme at the University of Oxford. The researchers would also like to thank the Faculty of Theology and Religion and Christ Church, Oxford for their encouragement.
