Parents adopt technology to reach out to kids

By Tim Barker

Jun. 11, 2008 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- It was during her oldest daughter's first year in college that Betsy Fentress realized something had to change. It was becoming increasingly difficult to get in touch with her child by phone.

"I found that she wouldn't answer," said Fentress, of University City. "She would text me back and say, 'What's up?'"

Ah, texting. That key to a young person's heart. Or at least her brain.

Today, Fentress thinks nothing of pecking out messages on her cell phone when she needs to get a message to her daughter, who just finished her sophomore year. And she sees little reason to think it will be any different with her other five children as they grow older.

They are, after all, like other young people, who use a wide range of tools to do their talking. They text, they blog. They keep in touch through social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Bebo. And sometimes, they'll even pick up a telephone.

It can be argued that no other generation in history has grown up in a world so dominated by the need to adapt and adjust to technological changes. Parents may not be under the same pressure -- from peers, educators and high-powered marketing -- as their children.

But that doesn't mean they can ignore the latest, greatest fads, particularly when it comes to the ways their children want to communicate.

"This is the first generation of teens dealing with the cell phones and the Internet. And so it is also the first generation of parents," said Sarah Burningham, author of "How to Raise Your Parents: A Teen Girl's Survival Guide."

Experts say parents will have better luck keeping in touch if they learn to use some of the same tools employed by their offspring. This applies especially to texting, which has become the top choice for electronic communication among teens, according to a recent study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

"This is just the way it's going to be. We as parents have to accept that," said Larry Rosen, a psychology professor at California State University and author of "Me, MySpace and I: Parenting the Net Generation."

In the Pew study, 36 percent of teens said they texted every day, surpassing the 35 percent who say they talked on the cell phone every day. And while experts say e-mail remains popular with adults, only 16 percent of teens said they use it on a daily basis.

Nearly a half dozen times each day, Creve Coeur's Emma Carlson, 15, trades text messages with her mother, Cammie Carlson. Emma prefers texting because it lets her carry on multiple conversations at the same time. But also, there is the great uncertainty of a phone call.

"If you pick up the phone, you don't know how long you'll be on there," said Emma, a junior at Ladue Horton Watkins High School.

Her mother takes it in stride, content in the knowledge that she has a way to reach her daughter.

"If that works, that's fine. As long as something works," said Carlson, who initially struggled to overcome the feeling of goofiness that came with learning to type out messages on her tiny keypad.

There are, however, limits to how far parents can push things. For all of our technological advancements, the basic conflict of determining the boundaries is still a tricky one.

Fentress, for example, has resisted any urges to delve into the social networking sites used by her kids. And that's just fine with her second-oldest daughter Clare Fentress, 18.

Clare, who says she has nothing to hide, doesn't want her mother poking around Facebook for the sole purpose of checking up on her children. That's not what social networks were designed for, she said.

So would Clare allow mom to join her network of friends?

"I'm not sure I'd accept her as my friend," Clare said. "We'd probably have to talk about it first."

Her reluctance to see her mother patrolling Facebook illustrates the challenge facing parents. They are urged to learn more about websites and games favored by their children but then are told to keep a respectful distance. Get close, but not too close.

Nowhere is that more clear than in the case of social networks, which let users create circles of friends that share things like music, photos and stories. According to one recent Pew study, 55 percent of online teens -- 93 percent of teens use the Internet -- have created a profile on MySpace or Facebook.

Experts say parents should sit down with their children periodically to check out their profiles and the networks of friends created by their kids. "Just knowing an adult is lurking can have a good effect," said Patty Carleton, director of Youth Services for the St. Louis Public Library.

But actually trying to join the child's network is a different matter.

"There it starts to get a little creepy," said Gary Rudman, a California-based market researcher who specializes in kids and teens. "It's like a parent coming to the senior prom or a frat party. It's just a little awkward."

Not everyone, however, shares Rudman's opinion.

Julie Cavellero of Imperial joined MySpace two years ago specifically to get closer to her oldest son, who had gone off to college. He was her first friend on the site. Next up was her younger son, who was 16 at the time.

It was the beginning of a trend, with 35 of her 39 MySpace friends coming largely from the ranks of her children and their buddies. For Cavellero, it has been an opportunity to get back in touch with earlier days, when her home served as the gathering point for neighborhood kids. "They practically lived at my house," she said.

Her involvement in these younger circles works, she said, because of the open relationship she has with all of them. But that doesn't mean she abdicates the role of adult.

She recalls a time when she noticed something amiss on one of her teen friend's pages. The girl had acquired a friend whose profile picture raised some alarm bells. She would soon learn that the questionable photo was just a joke.

"That was my friend's daughter," Cavellero said. "So I picked up the phone and said who's this weird-looking guy on your page?"

tbarker@post-dispatch.com -- 314-340-8350

Newstex ID: KRTB-0187-25920530