Linda Moran: January 2006 Archives

Friendships among girls sure are different and more complicated than that of boys. I recently had a discussion with my two girls, separately of course (everything's hush-hush and personal these days), about how girls form groups. Their answers were revealing:

The Twelve Year Old says:

There's a group of girls that wants to be popular so we call them "the popular girls." But they're not really. My group is just as liked as they are. My group is the "nice girls but not popular."

The popular girls are really annoying sometimes. Once a month they all dress alike in the same checkered skirts. They walk around wearing too much makeup and say things like "that's really sexy." They love that word "sexy." They're sometimes mean to the other girls.

The Ten Year Old says:

Oh it's the fourth graders that have a lot of popular girls. I definitely don't want to belong to them. They pick on nice people and play jokes on them. They're not any better than us.

If you've ever hoped for your kids to be popular, perhaps the above assessment, straight from the horse's mouth, will dissuade you. Clearly, though, groups are unavoidable. It seems to me that self-confident kids would be happy to belong to the "nice but not popular" group.

It seems to me that girls exhaust themselves in their social and emotional issues. It tires me out just watching them. The only thing worse, I imagine, is if my girls were in the popular group.

After thinking about his, I'm feeling a sense of relief that my almost eight-year-old is a boy. But then again, he has his own issues. He's a little isolated with his highly active imagination, and no sports gene whatsoever.

But that's another topic for another day.

Chapter 9 of The Primal Teen by Barbara Strauch covers the influence of hormones on brain development. It was once conventional wisdom that hormones influence only the parts of the brain linked to sexual behavior. But now the studies show that hormones influence the overall brain.
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In fact, they're responsible for some of the cognitive differences we see between men and women.

The author is quick to point out the cognition differences are only statistical differences, and that there are many exceptions.

But that said, I once had a female friend who gave the most elaborate of directions to her house. You know the deal--the guy says, "Make a right on Cottage Street, go exactly 1.43 miles, left on Main, go five lights, make a right." Not my friend.

Her directions had so many landmarks and emotions that hubby and I exaggerated them a tiny bit each time we took the trip.

“Go up the big hill, then down, then up an even bigger hill, then you'll see Brendan’s old dentist, which is next to where Tina’s friend gets speech therapy. Make a left there. Then follow the gravel road, the cemetery will be on your left. Keep going after you can't see the cemetery any more, don't worry, you're still on the right road but the name changes..."

You get the idea. We all know about this male/female difference, right?

Well, a study was done on male and female rats in mazes. Here's what they found:

1. Female rats were more willing to take a wrong turn, but they got there in the end. (Hmmm...we all know about THAT male/female difference, too.)
2. When the researchers took away some bright-colored LANDMARKS from the mazes, the female rats got hopelessly lost, but not the male rats.
3. When the researchers changed the GEOGRAPHY of the maze slightly, such as making one hallway longer, the male rats became confused and disoriented, but not the female rats.

The author's conclusion: "This suggests a difference in strategy, not performance. A female giving directions to her house might say: 'Turn right at the big white church.' A male, on the other hand, might say: 'Go 1.45 miles and turn south-southwest'."

So, we can be on the lookout for cognition differences. And we can be aware that this is not so much caused by cultural influences; rather, it's the influence of our kids' hormones on their thinking.

I’d like to think that by observing these emerging traits in my kids, this is a way to “live with them in understanding.”

I want to try and understand my teens and tweens, and I think I can make some headway just by being aware of some of these interesting details that come from brain studies.

Perhaps one of our biggest jobs is to stand by, just far away enough, and just close enough, to observe.

Do you remember being a teen, and feeling as though nobody understands you? It’s not clear to me that this loneliness is such a good thing. But I haven’t finished reading the book.

Okay folks, I'm going through a major paradigm shift here. I"m finding out the cyberworld is a complex social arena, and my kid is part of the other world. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a technical newbie. In fact, I'm a web programmer. I have computer skills "better than the average mom."

But alas, I did grow up in the sixties, when there was no such thing as a tween crisis in cyberspace.

And there's no turning back for her. I'm the one that got a computer for each of my kids, and gave them web access, thinking that it's okay because I share the computer room with them. I'm the one that moved them to this town, where everybody that's anybody is plugged in.

Well it is okay; it's just that they're in a culture that is hard for me to understand. I don't think I ever built that "computer as social arena" compartment in my brain. I think I had better now.

Three of my kids play on neopets.com, a place where you can adopt a cyber-pet. I thought that was okay. Pretty simple. I often see cute little pets on their screen. But it's more complicated than that. I should have known.

Now I find out one of my kids owns a neopets guild, which is a collection of friends, but that's about all I know of that part of it. Something catastrophic happened, she said, and now she's in a crisis.

Last week's crisis had been enough for me to swallow. She told me that somebody hacked into her friend's neopets account, and then the account was frozen by neopets for bad behavior. (I didn't ask.) My kid spent hours with her friend trying to straighten this out with the company.Basically she spent all of Saturday afternoon on this project. Never saw the light of day.

My kid is developing technical skills? Okay, that's one way to look at it. She's learning how to deal with authority figures? She's being generous to a friend? All true.

But I pondered the value of a twelve-year-old spending her afternoon fixing something in cyberpsace. They never really got the problem fixed, as they could not convince the company that there really had been a hacker

Anyhow, today she told me a little more about that crisis. She told me that the neopets company now owns her friend's artwork because it's no longer accessible to her friend, but it's in the hands of the company. Artwork? Cyberspace? Ownership rights? I did not have this kind of life when I was twelve.

But here's what she went on to tell me that really blew my mind. Until yesterday she had failed to realize that since this other kids' account is in her guild, the hacker got access to the guild, and posted all kinds of trash. Now the guild is in peril, the accounts have all been disabled (don't ask me by whom but my teeny bopper could explain it), and today she went to school with this plan foremost on her mind:

She must find all her friends who are in the guild and explain to them what happened, and that it wasn't her fault. Now she's trying to preserve friendships and her own reputation.

In a way, because of computers, our children are more social, not less. But in the most innovative of ways that even the greatest thinkers of just ten years ago couldn't have imagined.

I was at a loss as to how seriously to take this. Was this a problem with real people or a problem with a computer game? I think I know the answer, but it sure caused new neurons to fire in my brain.

She's heartbroken over her guild, but as she talked it out with me, she also found herself straddling the two worlds, just as I do. After pouring out her heart to me, and apprising me of her urgent plans of the day, She said this:

"It's okay, though. It's just Neopets."

Parents vary widely from one family to the next in their rules about computer use, and all of it is valid. Here are a few things I've heard from speaking with parents:

1. I've tried to delay heavy computer use until my kid is much older. I'd like him to live in the real world, not the cyber-world.

2. I give her limited computer use, because there are so many dangers out there.

3. The computer is a way for my kid to talk to friends.

4. The computer games my son plays are harmless, and even thought-provoking, such as Sim City 3000, in which you can build entire towns and cities, and become the mayor and manage your city financially.

5. I'm afraid I'll get the safety instructions wrong and put my kids in danger. I'd rather just say no to the computer.

6. Programs on their hard drive are okay, but not the internet.

7. Programs on their hard drive are okay, and e-mailing, but not the web.

8. Programs, e-mail, and web sites are okay, (I have parental controls) but not chat rooms.

9. I allow everything because I know how to set it all up for safety.

10. I'm afraid he'll download something.

11. I don't even know what parental controls are.

12. Oh my kid is on the computer a lot. Kids today are different. I'm glad she's comfortable with the computer.

As you can see, one big reason why parents resist the computer has to do with their own perception of their computer ability.

But it also has to do with beliefs, values and feelings. Beliefs about technology-dependence, what friendships are supposed to look like, values about how important, safe, or essential computers may or may not be, and feelings about safety, are all factors.

And it can also change over time. In fact, many of us would describe this aspect of our family life as "flailing about."

Personally, I like IM chats because it leaves my telephone free. Kids need their peers as much as possible. When I was a kid, my main access to friends was by telephone, but it was a constant issue because we had one phone line, and worse, the telephone was treated in my home as an emergency tool only.

Our kids are social creatures, and studies now show they learn about adult relationships by years of practice in adolescence.

I find my kids love to chat with their friends, and they even use IM chats regularly to do homework together. Before you freak out, remember that teachers encourage teamwork more than they used to. Homework is more thought-provoking than it was a generation ago, too.

I see my kids brainstorm with other kids, sometimes tutor other kids, and sometimes receive tutoring from other kids. All in an IM chat! And what's more, they're safe at home while they're doing it.

But one reason for my comfort is that I've learned that my child's IM "preferences" can be set up as "opt-in." This means that there is a simple setting you can configure so that nobody has access to your kid unless your kid explicitly adds them to his buddy list. Suddenly, knowing this can reduce the fears. Your child's privelege of using instant message can now hinge on his trustworthiness to keep that setting and to disallow friends from inviting unknown friends to join. It comes down to trust.

If you'd like to allow your child to use chats, but you're not technically savvy, let your kid set it up and then show you what he did. Make him prove to you by showing you the setting that it's an opt-in setting. Then check it once in a while.

Chats are just one example of how you can nuance computer use, just by having a little knowledge. And happily, we clueless parents can learn from our kids. A requirement that our children teach us even appears on the printable parent contract that is issued by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.

Regardless of your very valid feelings, beliefs, and values, and your computer-knowledge or lack thereof, it is reasonable to suggest that all parents place themselves somewhere on the learning curve and begin to arm themselves with knowledge, a little at a time. Iincreasing your child's priveleges can be linked to her willingness to take the time to teach you. My kids consider it a sweet deal.

And lest you think they may pull the wool over your eyes, the truth is they only know a little more than you do. It's not as easy as you might think to be led astray. Make your education from them a condition of their computer use. That will be easy--it's in the parent contract, and they have to sign it. And just by virtue of being your teacher, they'll be more likely to stay on the straight and narrow.

You might like to print the parent contract. And while you're at it, print the child's contract, too. They are both a nice springboard for discussion.

I remember the first time I taught my kids to respect other parents' styles. My daughter was in the second grade, and hubby and I had just given her "the talk." With the help of a thorough book, we had explained to her all about the birds and the bees in an in-your-face approach. We did the same for each of our kids--each one near the end of second grade.

Now I know that's kind of on the early side for some of you, but that's exactly my point. That's just our style. So we then went on to explain to each of them how other parents may wait longer, may explain more slowly, may not explain as much detail. And they need to respect that.

So no going and spilling the whole story to your friends, okay? Parents have the right to be the first ones. Well, if you live in New Jersey that has its limits. By the end of the fifth grade, they're taught it all in school. But there's a long time between second and fifth grade.

I did give them permission, however, to correct misinformation. When kids aren't told by their parents, misinformation can creep in from other sources. Word does go around on this topic! So if they're with a friend who gets on the subject, and that kid clearly has their facts wrong, my kid may use their best judgment about correcting the facts at hand. Any parent would appreciate that.

We guard the styles of other parents with Santa Claus, too. Once each of our kids discovered the truth, we reminded them that their friends might still be "believers," and how about if we keep this to ourselves for now? It's all about respect for other people's families. Oh, and while you're at it, see if you can keep the secret from your younger siblings!

It's not that we do everything early in our family, though. My twelve-year-old daughter has a few friends whose moms give them more freedom on the computer, and more roaming slack after school. It's a fine line to walk because I want my kids to know the importance of our boundaries, but by now they are able to easily absorb this idea of respect for the choices of other kids' parents.

And so it was, that when my ten-year-old was with a friend recently, and the subject of Harry Potter came up, my kid didn't bat an eyelash when her friend announced she wasn't allowed to read Harry Potter. My kid may have had an opinion about this, but communicating respect reigns supreme when it comes to parents rules, and so she just smiled and said "oh."

I think teaching our kids this respect tends to uncomplicate the whole computer issue a bit. We can explain that some parents know more than we do, and some parents know less. Some parents have more fears than others. And very important, birth order matters. Our seven-year-old plays on The Sims because it's in the house. He's got older siblings. Parents seem to get more lenient with their younger children once theyve put their toe in the water with the first kid. If you've got a pack of kids like we do, all heck breaks loose by the fourth.

So here's what I've told my kids about the computers:

"Some of your friends are not allowed to use chat rooms at all. But it's okay, you can e-mail them. Or, heaven help us, call them on the phone. Some of your friends might not be allowed to use web-based games such as Neopets. So when you're over their house, don't introduce it. Some kids might not have parental controls on their computers. This means when you are on your friend's computer, be especially aware that yucky stuff could come up, and be ready to say, 'Let's go do something else,' or better yet, 'I think we better show this to your mom.'"

I guess what I'm saying is that we need to remember that our kids are social creatures. As with everything else, unpacking our thinking is perhaps more important than the rules themselves. They need to have conversations with us about the real world of kids' computers and kids' parents.

Lessons well learned come back to us. I think my own kids have come by roundabout way to respect my style and my rules. After all, we're parents, too.