T he rise of a new generation of cynical, bleak and disaffected youth, Generation X, has long been discussed by hip novelists, TV commentators and news media.

Two Stanford sociologists, Eric Rice, 25, and his mentor, sociology Professor David Grusky, 40, decided to test whether young adults born after the hippie and yuppie generations are really more cynical and bleak.

Based mostly on anecdotal evidence, there is a belief that young adults today are more disaffected than past generations, their pessimism arising from concerns about problems ­ AIDS, high divorce rates, racial strife, homelessness and a shortage of good jobs ­ inherited from preceding generations, said Rice, a graduate student.

So, Grusky and Rice turned to the national General Social Survey, the only high-quality source of data available, to compare the attitudes of current young adults to those of past generations at a time when they were between 18 and 29 years old. The researchers compared the answers to identical survey questions in three time periods since 1972.

The results show that as the media have suggested, "a great many contemporary young adults are cynical about institutions, bleak about the future, and generally dissatisfied with their own lives," Grusky said. Overall, about 35 percent of young American adults were members of the disaffected "X-class" in the 1990s, compared with 20 percent in the 1970s and 25 percent in the 1980s.

But they also found that "the rising disaffection appears in all age groups rather than merely the youngest ones," Grusky said.

"Whatever the causes of disaffection, they are not ones that we Generation Xers experience uniquely, although we may very well feel our experience is unique," Rice said.

Media commentators may be right in emphasizing the malaise-inducing effects of "historical underdosing," the researchers said. The term refers to the belief that history has come to an end, with such institutions as the family and government becoming ever more corrupt and exhausted. It suggests that the great regenerative struggles of the past, such as civil rights and feminism, already have been fought, and all that is left is the winding down and decay of present institutions. "If anything, older individuals are especially vulnerable to romanticizing the past and thus becoming disaffected and disengaged with the present," Grusky said.