Duffy says he’s even heard tales of kids who don’t want their parents to know where they’re going putting their phone in a Ziplock bag in the bushes outside the A+ student’s house (Aidan again!) and then continuing on their merry (and untraceable) way. But unless you are a programmer for Google, your teenager may be one step ahead of you. These cases come in a wide variety of prices to fit most types of cell phones.īasic smartphone tracking and find-a-friend apps are simple ways to keep track of your teen’s whereabouts when you suspect he’s being less than forthcoming. To keep one step ahead of teens getting into risky business, Cameron recommends that parents supply teens with a cell phone battery charge case to head off the “My phone died” excuse. “Like any good lie,” he says, “there’s a kernel of truth in it.” Bruce Cameron, a counselor who works with adolescents in the Dallas, Fort Worth metroplex and has a 15-year-old son, says kids often go where they say for a short time, until they move on to the next spot, which their parents may not know about. Or they might tell you where they’re going and just omit a few key details. See, I was just where I said I would be.” If they’re up to no good, they can say, “You can look at my account. So your child might put a picture with their friends at the mall on this Instagram account. One clever way that teens get away with their adolescent antics is by setting up a second Instagram account that they call “Finsta,” as in “fake insta,” to which their parents are invited. Then there are the stories that make parents cringe and want to track their child’s every move. “By taking a picture and putting it up online,” says Duffy, “you are verifying that you’re out and, well, you’re 14.” There’s nothing cooler than that. Then there’s the classically misguided, mid-getting-stoned selfie, which can live online forever for prospective colleges and employers to see. There’s the fad of taking selfies documenting daredevil stunts: standing on one foot, the other hanging in mid-air, on the roof of a tall building or even climbing up a crane. Once they get bored with hanging out in the parking lot or the basement, all they need to do is reach for the miraculous screen tucked in their back pocket. Clark says that it’s basic teen chemistry: teens are looking for that dopamine “high” that makes them “naturally drawn to situations and places where their dopamine will be raised.” Dopamine, explains Clark, is a neurotransmitter that, among other functions, gives us a pleasurable reward when stimulated.Īnd technology has altered the landscape for today’s teenagers, enabling them to seek out new possibilities for adventure, trouble, and outwitting their parents. The reason, Clark says, is the teen brain is programmed to want more. I don’t want kids to sound too dastardly, but by and large, lots of times they aren’t where they say they are.” Risky business at those teen hangoutsĪ lot has changed since you were a teenager, but one thing hasn’t: Teens are thrill seekers by nature. And while basements and parking lots seem like pretty benign places to be, Duffy confirms that, yes, teens of all stripes “tell me they are often not entirely honest about where they hang out. Duffy, author of The Available Parent, has been working with teens for 20 years. “Basements are big,” psychologist John Duffy says, especially the basement where no parent is to be seen within a quarter-mile radius. “Even if it seems like there’s nothing going on there, the point is that other teens are there.” “That’s why you’ll find them hanging out in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven,” he says. Jerusha Clark, co-author of Your Teenager is Not Crazy: Understanding Your Teen’s Brain Can Make You a Better Parent, says that if you’re on the lookout for teens in the wild, it’s not too hard to find them because they’ll be where there are other teens. The bracing truth is that in the 21st century, a teen is often seeking out and doing what teens have done for decades. So when your teen tells you they’re headed to the movies or the mall, how do you know they’re telling you the truth? And if they’re not, where are they going? Plus, teens crave at least some privacy and autonomy, which is also developmentally appropriate. Teens hone the life skill of telling Mom or Dad what they want to hear because they figure if they told the truth, their parents’ heads would explode. There are, in all probability, millions of other teens who aren’t anywhere close to where they told their parents they were going. You know Aidan? He’s the honors student who never gets in trouble.īut let’s be real. Of the approximately 26.2 million American kids, ages 12 to 17, millions of them are probably exactly where they told their parents they would be: the mall, the high school dance, the “kick back” at Aidan’s house.
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