ABSTRACT

As the bus drops off the 15-year old girl, she runs into the house, dropping her bag at the door. With a perfunctory “hi mom” she races to the computer. Soon a sweet “blingg” is sounded. This is the time she has looked forward to all day; it is her time to “hang out” with friends. Just like generations before her, “hangout time” is essential to adolescent social, emotional, and spiritual development. Unlike previous generations, however, hang-out time has increasingly included new technological companions that take the form of computers, cell phones, video games, or some yet-to-be-invented device. However exciting and new the technology may be, there is no doubt it fundamentally changes how adolescents and family members communicate with one another by the way it substitutes text for speech, smiley faces for smiling friends, and computermediated presence for real-live togetherness.