Authors

Discussion

The Covid-19 pandemic created "impossible" changes, which became a social experiment worldwide and had different consequences for the adaptive behavior of different birth cohorts and in Lithuania. Those changes are related to work, family relationships, and prospects. This presentation analyzes the 1990-2000 cohorts whose early socialization took place during the period of transformation after the end of the Soviet regime when Lithuania regained its independence in 1990. The life scenarios of these cohorts have been affected not only by changes in political, economic, and social life but also by the adaptive behavior of their parents, which varies from successful adaptation to very complicated ones. In cases where, for various reasons, parents cannot adapt during the period of transformation, children must assume their parents' responsibilities and obligations in the family. Such experiences influence their subsequent life scenarios related to profession, job change, and family. And during the Covid-19 pandemic, initiatives are taken that would not even be considered in "normal" times.

The behavioral patterns of these cohorts are analyzed in terms of the effects of internal and external adapters, as suggested by Riesman, Glazer, and Denney (1989). The presentation is based on 40 life story interviews collected within the framework of the ongoing project "Growing up in Independent Lithuania: Life Courses of 1980-2000 Cohorts, Behavioral St