it gets weird if you're telling yourself "I should make eye contact"? it does for me, too. Even if I don't, I'll sometimes hold someone's gaze in conversation and feel an awkwardness - did i do it too long? or wrong? is there "wrong"? But I guess we get better.

Sadly, I notice a lot of younger people who avoid eye contact all together. Perhaps they've never developed the skill having grown up with such massive amounts of screen time?

Dead on. It gives a terrible crutch to the natural awkwardness that comes with that age, and if you give someone literally any place to hide, they'd rather hide than meet you head-on. I've also noticed a mistrust when you take an interest in them (not in a creepy way duh), but there seems to be an abundance of "who? me?" mentality and it's also traceable back to social media and this culture of unachievable "fame" and influencer-statusness.