Charge Your Phone, Change Your Life

Kids these days. Gone are the times when people talked with each other, interacted in person. Today, young people spend hours glued to screens — phones, computers, tablets, perpetually connected to the internet, apps, and games.

Do I sound like your parents yet?

As parents and grandparents complain how things have changed, they might not realize just how different times really are. As an increasing number of families have fallen on hard times, poverty and homelessness is affecting a greater number of youth. Last week’s New York Times investigative piece, “Invisible Child,” which followed a New York City family led by a fearless 11-year-old named Dasani, showcases the extreme grips of family poverty — a reality that is becoming increasingly common. As the article points out, 22,000 children are homeless in New York City, including Dasani and her seven siblings, who all live with their parents in one room of a city shelter. The conditions are deplorable — the food expired, the bathrooms moldy, the roaches and bedbugs happier tenants than the human residents.

Baltimore doesn’t face this problem on the same scale as New York, but not because Baltimore has won The Race to End Homelessness. There are virtually no family shelters inside the city, so large groups must move to the county to stay together. Even so, Baltimore City saw an increase in youth and student homelessness — to around 1,700 students in 2012, although many of these youth have separated from their parents and family units.

One study reports homeless youth who end up couch surfing or dancing between different family members don’t really consider themselves “homeless,” although by standard definitions they are still unstable. Many times, they can hardly be considered “youth” either — one study demonstrates that children experiencing homelessness, tend to act as little adults, helping their parents pay bills and, find the next place to sleep. Most important, these young people feel it is crucially important to stay strong for their parents, so as not to worry them.

With no money for necessities, how can homeless youth be following the same supposedly unhealthy trends as their housed peers when it comes to technology use? Eighty percent of homeless youth reported using a social media site regularly. More than sixty percent of the youth surveyed own a cell phone, but the internet is also accessible at libraries and youth centers. While the average American youth might claim to be “addicted” to his or her phone, homeless youth in one study rank having a smart phone as equally important to having food.

How can this be? Is technological dependence just another detrimental effect of homelessness — along with the higher rates of mental illness, chronic physical health issues, and behavior problems? It may surprise older generations to learn that technological resources have some ability to curtail the strain of living unhoused. Youth on the street or separated from siblings in the foster system reported that the increased ease of contacting loved ones improved those relationships. Close ties to family in turn puts a child at an increased likelihood of making smart health decisions and staying emotionally strong.

It seems as though social networks are actually connecting homeless youth to what they need most — their support network. Certainly, there is more that both Baltimore and New York can do to support this group that has been forced to grow up too quickly, but while they wait, this population has impressively used their own devices to connect with resources and important people. Perhaps this generation of internet savvy, technologically addicted individuals will be able to network their way to a more promising future.