Teen chatter shifts from phone to instant messaging

By Dawn C. Chmielewski
Knight Ridder News Service

Interrupting a busy mother at her computer can be ugly. Just ask my 12-year-old son, who has suffered verbal decapitation for the minor offense of asking a question.

These days, when Alex wants to go to a friend's house or to play video games, he'll go to his computer and shoot me a quick Instant Message. It's easier — and far safer — than bursting into my home office uninvited.

This type of parent-child communication isn't all that unusual. Instant messaging is quickly replacing the phone as the preferred communication tool for kids ages 12 to 17.

Remember the old days, when we would spend hours talking on the phone to the same school friends we had just ridden home with on the bus? That's so last century.

Kids such as Kasey Lee, a 13-year-old middle-school student in Irvine, Calif., can't imagine being restricted to one conversation at a time. She prefers the party line quality of instant messages, which allow her to gab with as many as 10 friends simultaneously.

The conversations haven't changed much since the dark ages, when I was a teen. Kasey — one of an estimated 12.4 million teenagers who use instant messaging regularly — deconstructs the day's events at school, makes weekend plans or discusses "girl stuff" — boys — in her typed computer exchanges. It's part of her regular after-school routine: Snack, homework, IM.

The messages, though typed, feel like conversation, because it's nearly instantaneous. Unlike plain old analog chat, each message arrives with the urgency of a telegraph. The text box chimes and flashes on the computer screen to herald each fresh thread of conversation.

Kasey confesses to an almost Pavlovian response to the IM alert. She'll rush to the computer to catch each missive.

IM's unique blend of intimacy and physical distance emboldens kids such as 12-year-old Tyler Killion to overcome their shyness to do the unthinkable: Speak to girls.

Or, in Killion's case, initiate IM contact — then immediately sign off.

I remember reacting in shock when a friend described how her 15-year-old daughter had been asked out on a date via IM. How do you know it's not some adult posing as a kid? Will she be safe?

Turns out, it's not unusual for teenage boys to use IM to ask girls out on a date. The technology blunts the pain of rejection.

But the technology's broad reach is nonetheless worrisome to parents like me because of potential to expose kids to a whole new world of hurt.

Consider the case of the New York City teen who sent a risque photo to a boy she liked. He forwarded it to his friends, who forwarded it to their friends. In the space of an afternoon, it practically made it to Alaska, said Pew Internet researcher Amanda Lenhart, who learned of the episode through the middle school's principal.

Nearly every teen has a horror story. Killion recounted how someone impersonated him online and sent hurtful messages to all of his friends. "The next day, people at school were saying, 'Why did you say such mean stuff to me?' " he said. 'I wasn't even online."

It took a week to clean up the mess.

As parents, we find ourselves struggling with conflicting desires to protect our kids, yet not wanting to isolate them from such an integral part of being a teen.

The conflict played out recently, when a boy in my son's social circle, Kyle, used IM to play pranks on friends. He created a bogus profile for one friend that provoked 30 unwanted solicitations from strangers. He invited another friend into a private online chat room, only to embarrass the boy in front of a girl he liked.

Kyle's online abuse presents problems for my friends, who don't know how to shield their children from a technology they barely understand.

My friend used software tools to block Kyle's instant messages. The 11-year-old circumvented that by using another screen name. Another parent pulled her son from IM altogether

The urge to pull the plug can be strong. It takes a stronger parent to learn the technology that is as vital a communications tool as the telephone. Then, teach them to hang up on the occasional crank call.