IM-ing: now it's all in the family: instant messaging is helping to break down barriers between parents and their children.

• Author: Schwartz, John
• Position: Technology

Nina Gordon types out an instant message and sends it. The data travels some 500 miles, from the computer in her living room in Queens, N.Y., to America Online's servers in Northern Virginia, and then to her son Schuyler's computer, which just happens to be in the next room--about 20 feet away from where she is sitting.

you hungry for dinner?

After a little online banter over dining options, her son, a 17-year-old with a wicked sense of humor and no shortage of attitude, sends his request:

an insty pizza and a beer

don't push your luck, comes the reply.

Instant messaging, long a part of teenagers' lives, is working its way into the broader fabric of the American family. "It's certainly not just for kids anymore," says Michael Gartenberg of Jupiter Research, a firm that follows trends in the technology industry.

Almost three quarters of all teenagers with online access use instant messaging and about half of all adults have tried the services, surveys show. Adults, who generally began using the services from AOL, Microsoft, or Yahoo to stay in touch with co-workers during the day, are saying "this stuff I'm using for work is actually useful in my personal life as well," Gartenberg says.

AOL, which provides the most popular service, reports that more than one billion instant messages flow through its networks each day. And now, as families own more than one computer and the machines spread beyond the den, instant messaging is taking root within the home itself.

ONLINE VS. FACE TO FACE

Although it might seem silly to send electronic messages instead of getting out of a chair and walking into the next room, some psychologists say that the role of instant rues saging within families can be remarkably positive. In many cases, they say, the messages are helping to break down barriers between parents and their children.

"Conversation between parents and teenagers could be highly emotional and not necessarily productive," says Elisheva F. Gross, a psychologist at the University of California at Los Angeles. When young people are online, however, "it's their turf," she says. "It may be a way for parents to communicate in a language and in a space that their children are more comfortable with."

Teenagers already use online communications to take on difficult topics with one another, says Katelyn McKenna, a psychology professor at New York University. Preliminary results from a study she conducted last year, she says, suggest that...