<Maybe it's all relative with each generation, but it sure seems like the kids of today have a higher degree of social pressure to deal with.

Nah. Same pressures. Defining who you are. Adopting a tribe and persuading them to adopt you. Practicing at finding a mate. Exploring adult behaviors and finding out which ones fit and which ones are merely grown-up without being adult. Dealing with your demons, and maybe with other people's whom you've grown up with. Figuring out who's Dumbledore and who's Quirrel and who's Lockehart. Discovering what you're good at, and how to make a living at it. (Unhappily, some of us never get that last one straightened out...)

The "higher degree" you perceive is speed. We make them wait so long to enter the world fully fledged because there is so much to learn and to prepare. At the same time, the world moves so fast, so they have to make serious decisions in a hair's breadth of time. One misstep can take years to recover from. One moment's hesitation can cost you your place in the queue.

Slow down hurry up slow down hurry up

Today's youth have had little practice at reflection because there is no time for them to practice it. On the contrary, multitasking is learned in preschool. Social pressures are the same. It's self-knowledge that has changed. So social pressures seem more daunting.

Regards--
Mary Anne