Your daughter must be dead. This is what Archie Gottesman concluded when checking the location of his middle daughter, who had claimed to be with friends on a warm summer night in New York City. The tracker on the phone, and the phone, and the owner of the phone, a young woman in her 20s, was positioned right near the Hudson River, motionless, for hours. “I was sure I was in trouble,” Gottesman told me. There was nothing she could do but call and call and wake her husband to join in the worry. (The young woman’s companion answered his phone. They had been having a few drinks.)
Like many parents, Gottesman monitors her children’s location through the tracking app on her phone. It is a very widespread practice: around half of parents follow their teenagers, while a quarter continuous do it when those children become young adults. According to the Pew Foundation investigation, Women dominate the space: young women (31%) are tracked more often than young men (21%), and mothers conduct more surveillance than fathers.. google maps and regular Apple Watches and phones allow parents to locate their children’s whereabouts instantly. life360Another popular app, it includes additional features such as car crash detection above 25 mph and driving summaries that provide a “weekly snapshot of everyone’s driving behavior.”
Much has been written about the disadvantages or monitoring of children. Following teens electronically can thwart their independence and undermine trust when done secretly. It can be a confusing responsibility for the safety of the young person: a teenager who knows he is being tracked can absolve himself of any personal responsibility for knowing his whereabouts; Mom will save him. And children who resist parental surveillance may find ways to circumvent digital intrusion by parking their phone at home, letting the battery run down, or making fun of the technology. According to Lisa damourclinical psychologist and author of The emotional life of adolescents“When it comes to knowing what’s going on with a teen, knowing their location can’t replace having a solid working relationship.”
But how does child monitoring affect parents who supervise their children? “Usually people are using it to replace uncertainty with certainty.” meg jayauthor and clinical psychologist, wrote to me in an email. The more anxious parents are, the more likely they are to check the location of their children. “Therapists call people like these reassurance addicts, because instead of living with the discomfort of uncertainty for a while, they look for data or information that everything is okay,” he added. That peace of mind may not last long. Watching your kids party into the wee hours of the morning, eating dinner at a fast food restaurant for the seventh time that week, or spending the night at a mysterious location. provokes parental anxiety and often creates friction between partners about what to do, Jay added.
And to the extent that tracking provides a glimmer of security, that sense may be misguided: location tracking is a blunt instrument that can be easily misinterpreted; One child “stuck” in an unknown location may be carrying out a harmless project, while another seemingly safe in an apartment or dorm may be taking foolish risks.
