Language moves quickly across every generation. However, the words that Gen Z is using, whether because of TikTok or group chats, have pushed language change into overdrive. A lot of these words are terms that older generations don’t naturally pick up, either. Delulu? Mouse jiggler? Just what on earth do these terms mean, and where did they come from? Let’s find out.
The origins of Delulu
Delulu is a common word among Gen Z. While it didn’t start on TikTok, it feels like something that’s used almost exclusively on there now. Fans in early K-pop communities were already using a short form of “delusional” more than a decade ago. They used the term to tease other fans for becoming too wrapped up in imaginary relationships or for over-analyzing celebrity interactions. It eventually became the word “delulu.”
The rise of TikTok brought the phrase into more popular Gen Z use, and they started to use it to talk about their own unrealistic crushes or job hopes. English dictionaries then created an entry for the word, officially establishing “delulu” as a word. It’s now used to describe someone choosing to believe something that isn’t true, whether obviously or not.
Remote-work gadget turned slang
Originally, a “mouse jiggler” wasn’t meant to be a slang word. It was quite literally a tool, either a plug-in device or a small piece of software, that kept a computer from going into sleep mode. As you might expect, it did so by gently moving the cursor. These devices existed before remote work became widespread, although they were relatively exclusive to security work. Investigators used them to keep seized computers active while they copied data from them.
But then came the pandemic. Millions of people started working from home, and their bosses kept a close eye on their active status while they were away from the office. That’s when the mouse jiggler became popular. Gen Z started using these devices to keep their status lights green, and it didn’t take long for the phrase to become part of regular conversations.
What’s especially interesting about this phrase is that neither the name nor the meaning ever changed. Gen Z simply made a gadget into an everyday language term.
Side characters in the new lexicon
“NPC” and “brain rot” are some more phrases popular with Gen Z. While both of these terms are also used by Gen Alpha, you’re unlikely to hear anybody from older generations using them or even knowing what they mean.
The term NPC got its meaning from gaming, where it stands for “non-playable character.” Essentially, an NPC refers to a character in a game that the player doesn’t get to control and doesn’t have much of a role to play. Think the Koopas in Mario games. Gen Z then started to use it to describe someone behaving in an oddly scripted way. They’re saying that the other person is like a side character in life, rather than someone important.
Brain rot refers to low-quality viral videos on platforms like TikTok. The content is usually very short and fast, but also quite surreal. Gen Z calls it “brain rot” due to scientific research suggesting that watching huge amounts of short-form content can harm your brain and attention span. One of the most famous examples of brain rot includes Skibidi Toilet, although that’s more for Gen Alpha.
One person clearly outdoing another
Mogging is another term that both Gen Z and Gen Alpha share. It came from the phrase “AMOG,” which stands for “alpha male of the group.” An “AMOG” was supposedly the most powerful person or the leader of the group, and the phrase was shortened to “mog.” It then changed from a noun to the verb “mogging.”
The idea of the word is quite simple. Mogging is when a person makes another person, whether they’re in the group or not, look weaker or less impressive. They have to do something that’s quite direct and clear to put the other person down.
For example, when a Gen Zer sees a person who has a much better outfit than another person, they’ll say that the person with the worse outfit “got mogged.”
How researchers track Gen Z slang online
While the terms themselves might feel quite messy, researchers have been able to track their usage quite closely. TikTok captions and comments create a clear trail for linguists to see how certain words appear, as well as which videos they’re more popular in. They’re able to see when and where new phrases become popular.
Many linguists have noticed that there are a few patterns in how some of the words are created. A lot of them come from clipping (shortening longer words) or are borrowed from media like video games. Others become popular simply because of how often they get repeated. Short videos help the terms to spread quickly because Gen Z hears the same audio or reuses the same caption style over and over. It helps slang travel much farther than it would in regular speech.