Only half of austerity-era teens think they will own a home [infographic]

Ireland's teenagers are worried about their chances of ever getting a job, being forced to leave home to do so and whether or not they will ever own a house of their own.

The study of 2,000 teenagers also found that the soaring cost of rent is effecting their choice of third level education with 47% saying rents will influence where they go to college or university.

More than half of those interviewed also admitted that their school work suffers because of their heavy social media usage.

School, exam pressures, and the points race were cited as the biggest strains on their mental health.

Three quarters also used a smartphone to study.

The research, conducted by Studyclix.ie, also confirms that Facebook is old hat with 90% of the pupils using Snapchat.

It also confirmed that students have little respect for the current crop of politicians but are more confident than might be expected with most of them happy with their looks.

Co-Founder of Studyclix.ie Luke Saunders said secondary school students are more unsure about their future as they grew up during austerity and recession.

“These Irish second level students are much more aware of the difficulties awaiting them when they go to college.

“Affordability is becoming an ever more important factor when selecting where to go to college,” he said.

“This trend was also repeated when it came to purchasing a house with 52% of students stating that it was unlikely that they would be able to purchase a house in their own county once they begin working.

“I was not at all surprised to see that 76% of students report using their smartphone to study. In the last three years we have seen a rapid increase in the proportion of our users studying on Studyclix.ie using mobile devices.”

The respondents’ role models are a motley crew: Conor McGregor, Bill Gates, and Barack Obama for the guys and Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, and Emma Watson for the girls.

Studyclix.ie sorts previous Junior and Leaving Certificate exam questions into topics and, for each topic and question, gives students access to the marking schemes and sample answers to help them understand how they can improve their answering technique.

It’s used by 57,031 secondary school students and 23,000 teachers .