Children are increasingly turning to personal technological devices, such as mobile phones, to define themselves and create social circles outside their families.
Business analysts and other researchers expect that the popularity of mobile, as well as the mobility and intimacy that comes with it, will continue to exploit and drive these trends.
"For children it has become an object that shapes their identity and changes their psyche," says Sherry Turkle, a social psychologist and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) who has studied the social impact of mobile communications.
"No one invents a technology knowing with certainty how it will be used or how it can change a society." And he adds that these trends are likely to continue as mobile phones metamorphose into “minicomputers” that fit in the palm of the hand.
Marketing experts and mobile manufacturers are eager to fill the last generational gap. Last fall, Firefly Mobile launched the glowPhone for preschoolers: it has a small keyboard with two speed dial buttons with a picture of a mother and father. AT&T promotes its wireless service through television ads that mock a mother who doesn't understand the slang her daughter uses on her cell phone.
Until now, the ability of parents to contact their children whenever they want has brought more advantages than disadvantages to families. Divorced Russell Hampton says it's easier for him to call his 14-year-old daughter Katie, even though they live in different time zones. And college students who don't have time for anything, like Ben Blanton, a freshman who plays baseball at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, can send a message to their parents when it's most convenient for them.
“Messaging is somewhere between calling and sending an email,” he explains. Of course he wouldn't even think of writing her mother, Jan, a letter. “It takes too long,” she says.
As with any cultural change that affects parents and children - such as the birth of rock 'n' roll or the sexual revolution of the 1960s - various chasms emerge. Members of the baby boom generation who warned decades ago that they could not trust their detached parents now sometimes realize that they are raising children who, thanks to the Internet and cell phones, believe that mom and dad are not there either. aware of nothing.
Mobile phones, instant messaging, emails and everything else encourage young users to create their own written language. This has basically offered them the ability to hide in the open air. They have a closer relationship than ever with their parents, but they are also much more independent.
In some cases, they may be further away from those closest to them, says Anita Gurian, a clinical psychologist and executive editor of AboutOurKids.org, a website of the Child Study Center at New York University.
"Mobile phones require a commitment from parents of a different nature," he says. "Children can do many things in front of their parents without them knowing."
Parents are always concerned about the well-being of their children, their independence and their behavior, and the popularity of mobile phones adds another twist to that dynamic. Regardless of how things turn out, you will have helped instant communications companies educate parents about how to stay in better contact with their children.
In a survey published a year and a half ago, AT&T revealed that, of the 1.175 parents the company had interviewed, about half had learned to send and receive messages with the help of their children. More than 60% of parents admitted that it had helped them communicate, but that sometimes their children did not want to hear their voice.
"Just because you can call them doesn't mean they'll answer," says Amanda Lenhart, a senior research specialist at the Pew Internet & American Life Project who studies the impact of technology on teens.
Savannah Pence, 15, explains that she wants to stay in touch with her parents, but sometimes she also wants to keep some distance. She claims that her father, John, made sure that both she and her 19-year-old brother, Alex, waited until they got to high school to have cell phones, unlike their friends who already had them in fifth grade. And although Savannah considers the relationship between her parents and her to be quite good, she still prefers to have her space. "I don't send many messages with my parents in front of me because they read them," she says.
At first, John, who owns a restaurant in Portland, Oregon, wasn't sure how to relate to his daughter. "I didn't know how to communicate with her," he admits. "I had to learn". So Savannah gave him a crash course in texting. John is well aware of the extent to which mobile phones, iPods and small consoles can destabilize family relationships.
"I see children writing messages under the table in the restaurant," he says. «They don't know that that time is to have a conversation. "Sometimes I would like to go up to the table and say, 'Kids, put away your iPod and your cell phone and talk to your parents.'"