Do You Track Your Young Adult Kids' Locations?

**Brian Lehrer** (0:08)
Brian Lehrer on WNYC. All right, to end the show today, we're gonna open the phones on this question. Do you track your teen or your young adult child track their location through their smartphones? 212-433-WNYC, or maybe you are the teen or young adult whose parents does location tracking of you with that particular app that's very common.
212-433-9692, call or text. Why do I ask? Well, there was a story on NPR's Morning Edition a little while ago. Maybe you heard it about whether it's okay to track your 18 to 25 year old children. That was the age slice for that story, 18 to 25, to track them on their smartphones with features like find my iPhone. You know how iPhones give you the option to share your location with contacts. That NPR story came from their health and science correspondent, Alison Albury. She investigated the results of a survey from the University of Michigan, which found the quote more than half of parents, 52 percent of 18 to 25 year olds say they track their adult children using smartphone apps. Now, most parents, according to the survey, cited peace of mind as the main reason they were tracking their children. We should note that this was a survey of 1,542 parents of 18 to 25 year olds. That's pretty robust sample. Do you do this or are you a 25 year old or younger who has voluntarily subjected yourself to parental tracking? We'll get to the voluntary part, 212-433-WNYC. Parents, why do you do it? Young adults and teens, why do you allow it?
212-433-9692 call or text. And here's that point. It's apparently not just parents who want this. When I first heard it, I thought, oh boy, this is the family version of the surveillance state. I'm glad they didn't have this when I was a teenager. But as it turns out, a lot of the teens and young adults see it more as security than surveillance. A friend of mine, who I talked about this with off the air, has a 15-year-old who the mom says wants the tracking because it makes her, the daughter, feel safer when she's out in the world. So does that sound like you if you're the teen or young adult, or does that sound like your kid if you're the parents? 212-433-WNYC, call or text 212-433-9692.
But then I guess we should also ask, does anyone have a teen or adult child who feels it's creepy, like the family version of the surveillance state? But this all made us want to put this question to you to help us report this story. Do you track your older teenagers or young adult children? Let's say anyone in that 25 or younger age group, and how does everyone feel about it? There is one more funny anecdote in the NPR story that I'll cite before we take a break and then take your calls and text. A parent checked their adult child's location and saw they were in an alleyway. Parents sent their kid a text to ask, why are you in a strange random alley? Turned out it was a Taco Bell drive-thru. So, at least that one ended well, unless you want to avoid fast foods like that. All right. Do you track your teens or young adult children? Are you one of those being tracked? Is it security for you? Is it creepy to you? 212-433-WNYC, call or text 212-433-9692.
We will hear what you have after this.
Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now to your calls and texts about tracking teens or young adults up through 25 years old. And we're gonna start with Brooke. And in Cliffside Park, you're on WNYC. Hi, Brooke.

**SPEAKER_3** (4:46)
Hi, that's interesting. I grew up in Cliffside Park, but I live in Horthorn now. And I said, Horthorn to your screener. That's fine, though. I do have three children, aged 24, 22, and 19
My son is my oldest, and he does not want to share his location with me. However, my daughters do, and I share my location with them. They say as much as me, it gives us peace of mind, especially that they all have their own cars and are driving.
So I think it all gives us peace of mind. But it also did start, they're all athletes. And lots of times when I would go see their games, the address on the schedules were wrong. So they started sharing their location just so I could get to where exactly they were playing as well.

**Brian Lehrer** (5:36)
What do you think is the difference?
Yeah, the difference between your daughters and your son. Why do you think he landed as the exception?