“This was hands down the best time to be a kid in the history of ever,” comments one of the Facebook group’s 148K members in response to a post featuring a 90s television program.
This many people gather online to reminisce about the past for a good reason. Psychology professor and researcher Krystine Batcho from LeMoyne College explains for National Geographic that while nostalgia is often seen as a private reflection, it actually helps us connect with one another by reminding us of our earlier relationships. This emotional connection encourages us to seek support from others. Nostalgia is particularly linked to childhood memories because, as Batcho points out, “In childhood, we were loved simply for who we were.”
Some may perceive nostalgia as melancholic or bittersweet, but research shows that for most people, it’s a positive emotion that evokes warmth, fondness, and a sense of belonging. Many things can trigger nostalgia, like places or smells, but movies, music, and photos are especially meaningful.
“Familiar media from our past brings us emotional comfort, but it also meets a cognitive need: it encourages the belief that things will get better because they’ve been good before,” says Batcho.
There is an explanation for why often remember things in a positive light and romanticize our experiences through nostalgia. “Remembering things as better than they were serves an evolutionary purpose. If people were to remember things faithfully to the original, most women would never want to have more than one child,” Batcho notes humorously. “It’s a function of species survival that we can gloss over the bad portions of the past.”
So, what else does nostalgia do to our bodies and brains? As it turns out, quite a lot. It boosts our sense of well-being, inspires creativity, and makes us feel more youthful, alert, optimistic, and energetic. Nostalgia can even encourage us to take risks and pursue our goals. Additionally, it reduces our perception of pain and enhances our ability to detect threats.
Moreover, it appears that people are increasingly nostalgic now compared to before, according to GWI Zeitgeist. Gen Z is the most nostalgic generation, with 15% preferring to think about the past rather than the future. Millennials closely follow at 14%, with this trend gradually decreasing with age.
Both Gen Z and millennials are also driving nostalgia in the media. Half of Gen Z feels nostalgic for various types of media, closely followed by 47% of millennials.
Nostalgia doesn’t always have to be related to personal memories. Amid recent challenges like recovering from the COVID pandemic, navigating a cost-of-living crisis, and struggling to find jobs, younger generations are seeking comfort in a time before the internet and social media. Surprisingly, nearly 40% of Gen Z feels nostalgic for the 90s, even though most were born after 2000.
So, the 90s are definitely trending, but it’s not just because of Gen Z. Patrick Metzger explains that pop culture follows a 30-year cycle, which he calls the ‘Nostalgia Pendulum’. After analyzing 500 movies, he found that it usually takes around three decades for a remake to appear. For example, Ghostbusters originally came out in 1984 and was remade in 2016—a span of 32 years. Jurassic Park debuted in 1993, with Jurassic World following in 2015, 22 years later.
“The driving factor seems to be that it takes about 30 years for a critical mass of people who were consumers of culture when they were young to become the creators of culture in their adulthood,” Metzger writes on his blog. So, those born in the 90s are now in their mid-20s to early 30s and are inspired to create content similar to when they were growing up.
At the same time, Metzger highlights that on top of creators genuinely referencing their childhood, companies and advertisers recognize nostalgia as a powerful marketing tool. They consciously use the ‘Nostalgia Pendulum’ to build emotional connections with their intended audiences and are able to make bigger profits because of it.