Would you let your teenager stay in the hotel room while you went downstairs to eat breakfast in the restaurant on vacation? The majority of American parents would not, according to a new survey from the University of Michigan/C.S. Mott Children's Hospital. Only 31 percent say they would let their teenager walk a short distance alone to a café.
The survey also found that fewer than one in four parents were likely to let their teen go to another part of an amusement park without them, or even to a different exhibit at a museum. This was true even though more than half of parents said they track their kids' location by phone.
A family vacation is a great time to make memories and spend time together without being interrupted by soccer practice or homework. Yet I've met so many adults who remember with great fondness the time when they—either with their parents' blessing or otherwise—separated from their families on vacation, many even before they were teens.
