Coming of Age

American Demographics, Nov 1, 2004 by Noah Rubin Brier

In response to this, Church points out the way cell phones speed up and change planning and communication among teens. "In these days with cell phones, if there's a party, it's spread within five minutes and everybody knows about it. Suddenly the kids get a call that, 'We're all going to so and so's, his parents are gone.' That's when the peer pressure comes in, they all want to fit in, and that's why they make some of the poor choices they do," Church says.

This issue of peer pressure and teen's desire to fit in, is of course nothing new. For generations, teenagers have struggled to find their identity in a sea of confusion. Mobile technology is giving these teens a new tool to aid them in their struggle. It's giving them a chance to have more freedom and to communicate in a way that was once not a possibility until they moved away from home. There's no denying the fact that children are acting more like adults in their social interactions at a younger age than ever before, but in a world that puts speed at such a premium, who could expect anything less?