Gen Alpha is born from 2010 onwards – so children up to 14 now.
In this article, we:
- Take a look at their slang,
- Think about what this tells us about their psychology, and
- Figure out what creatives should do with this knowledge.
Gen Alpha Slang
skibidi – weird – usually bad, but can be good. Comes from a YouTube creator who made surrealist animated videos about toilets with human heads battling people with video cameras for heads. Skibidi then points to surreal – bad (as in not real or not trustworthy) or good (as in not normal or boring – special).
sigma – high status, lone wolf – higher status than an “alpha male”. Developed through gaming and memes. Someone who doesn’t look for the approval of other people, and is confident in themselves.
rizz – charm. rizzler – someone charming. From charisma.
mid – average or boring. Often used for people, things or situations.
stan – an intense fan. From the Eminem song “Stan” about an obsessed
fanum tax – taking something from someone. Originally from the Twitch streamer Fanum – who takes bites of food from his friends during his streams. It has evolved to mean taking a portion of almost anything from someone else.
How to think about Gen Alpha
Gen Alpha is the first generation to have had social media and online video streaming (like YouTube and Twitch) be a big thing since they were very young.
This has had a massive impact on the generation. It has created a generation in which Gen Alpha has grown up much more connected to other people around the world – than ever before.the most popular The best content for capturing Gen Alpha’s attention YouTubers and streamers like MrBeast and Flamingo are watched by Gen Alpha around the world.
Newer influencers (some of whose handles are a little too rude to write here) also get very fast traction among Gen Alphas – like the YouTuber that created Skibidi Toilet – and so the term skibidi. This is where a lot of the slang has come from – like fanum tax.
We see personality get more important – as social media algorithms massively reward the most popular people. This shows us why rizz has become a big deal.
Sigma is an interesting one. Where being an individual in your own niche can be valuable. Gen Alphas have seen influencers who are not mainstream – become incredibly successful by being themselves – not caring about what other people think of them.
What creatives can learn from this
Gen Alpha is definitely not boring. And they do not like boring. Things that are really unexpected or wacky catch Gen Alpha attention. If you are creating for Gen Alpha – for example if you are writing educational books or writing a kids TV show – you want to think about what engages them. Gen Alpha likes the unexpected – the wacky like skibidi toilets and fanum taxes have really captured the generation’s attention.
Group effects are specially strong effect on Gen Alpha – ideas that go viral really stick. So thinking about how content will get mainstream adoption is especially important. This may be investing a lot in trying to make ideas go highly viral (which will in most cases need you to try many different approaches with the chance that one takes off), or being able to invest a lot in media spend so that it becomes an idea that a lot of the generation will see and so will be able to talk to each other about – in person and online
So as a creative it is getting their attention with something unexpected – possibly wacky. And figuring out how to get the idea to spread widely enough that it can be talked about by Gen Alphas with each other online and offline.