Get ready to be shocked: A new 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair poll tells us that nearly half of us think that this decade of music is the worst music of any time period. In addition to that, about a third of respondents said they’d most want their kid’s music education to comprise learning about the Beatles — or, for another third, Mozart — as opposed to a more recent artist like Michael Jackson. Unbelievable, right?

Get ready to be shocked again. The music of whatever decade we are currently in is always the worst music… at least to parents. Research by neuroscientist Daniel Levitin has found that the music people like when they’re teenagers is the music they tend to like for the rest of their lives; the people who are adolescents now probably weren’t the ones answering the survey. In short, adults never think any generation of music surpasses any generation than comes after, but not necessarily before it. So, what does this mean?

For one, this could put musical tastes, or what is generally considered “good music” in perspective. For instance, parents of young girls who swooned over the Beatles when they were brand new probably thought The Beatles’ music was abhorrent. But today, we consider them to be the greatest music act of all time. Granted, they are the most successful, but more importantly the people who idolized the Fab Four when they were a teenage are adults now, and their musical tastes are considered classic. It is hard to consider a future where Taylor Swift or Justin Bieber are considered classic musical geniuses, but not many people though it would happen with the Beatles when they first entered the popular music scene.

Taste in music is, of course, completely subjective. Who you want to consider the greatest whatever of whatever era is up to you, but perceptions do exist regarding quality versus enjoyment. It’s hard to imagine someone arguing that The Black Eyed make genuinely better music than Mozart, or the Beatles, but then what is the point of music. Isn’t it to be enjoyed? Many would say that the best kind of music is a kind that provides a real emotional reaction, but isn’t enjoying something a kind of reaction? There is no definite answer to these topics, but it’s something to keep in mind.