Teens are spending less time together in person. Why that’s a problem | #childpredator | #onlinepredator | #sextrafficing

When 16-year-old Addya Agarwal wants to hang out with her friends in their hometown of Belmont, California, their options are limited.

“Sometimes we’ll just go to the library, which is near my school, and we’ll, like, play the library’s board games,” she says, “or we’ll talk or get food from the shopping center.” They’ll go to each other’s houses, too.

But they often get fed up with their rotating shortlist of places to go. This past summer, “sometimes we just opted not to hang out,” Agarwal says.

Agarwal is, like a lot of teenagers, feeling the pangs of a life less traveled, IRL.

The reasons for this social isolation are myriad. Some so-called third spaces — or places to gather outside of the home and school — prohibit teens from entering unsupervised, some simply no longer exist. In their absence, many kids turn to the digital world, including online gaming and social media.

That combination has been particularly hard on the nation’s youth, who may have fewer opportunities to develop social skills, such as navigating conversations with strangers and learning how to ask for help. Meeting up face-to-face is often crucial for healthy development, says Ben Mushlin, New York City-based psychotherapist and founder of Searchlight Therapy. It’s where young people build “those in-person social skills that we rely on in everyday life as adults,” says Mushlin, who frequently works with young adults.

Ultimately, the friendships and community that can be fostered through in-person connection are “the foundational blocks of success,” he says. Conversely, a lack of in-person connection can heighten the risk for anxiety and depression for some, Mushlin says.

So how did we get here? And what can parents and communities do about it?

To begin with, many classic teen hangouts are shutting down.

Researchers in the 1980s and 1990s found that the majority of teens spent time at a mall regularly, often with friends. But malls have been closing by the thousands. In 1986, there were 25,000 malls nationwide, according to a June 2026 report by Capital One. By 2023, that number had shrunk to 1,200.

In what some have dubbed the “retail apocalypse,” the malls left are emptying out. Agarwal and her friends used to visit the Hillsdale Shopping Center in San Mateo. “But we don’t go there as much anymore because it’s kind of far and it’s more empty now,” she says. “Some of the stores have been closing.”

Movie theaters have also been popular meet-ups for teens. Between the first quarter of 2016 and the first quarter of 2026, the number of movie theaters nationwide dropped 10% to 3,918, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Many of the public and private third spaces left, including some malls, limit teens’ access. For example:

• In the downtown district of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, including the beach and city parks, teens 17 and under are not allowed without a parent or guardian between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m.
• On Fridays and Saturdays, the National Harbor on the Maryland waterfront, prohibits entry to unaccompanied minors between 5 p.m. and 5 a.m.
• Buena Park, California-based theme park and waterpark Knott’s Berry Farm prohibits teens 15 and under from entering without a chaperone at various times throughout the week.
• The Deptford Mall in Deptford, New Jersey, limits entrance to anyone under 18-years-old from 5 p.m. Friday through Sunday closing without an adult at least 23 years old.

All cite safety as a motivation for their policies. “I think they’re worried about teens causing problems,” says Lenore Skenazy, president of Let Grow, a nonprofit focused on giving kids more freedom.

Whatever the reason, the effect is the same: fewer places for teens to spend time together on their own where they can build their confidence and independence.

Other factors play into kids’ ability to congregate.

Many parents, anxious about the dangers of the outside world, don’t let their kids stray too far from home. By 17 years old, about 60% of kids are still not allowed to leave their neighborhood unsupervised, according to a 2026 Institute of Family Studies survey of 24,000 U.S. parents.

“Another big issue is transportation,” says 16-year-old Karina Yue, who lives in Los Angeles County. “After we reach the age where we can get a driver’s license, some of us can’t afford insurance or we can’t afford to buy a car.” And not every state has reliable public transportation.  

Finally, finances are also a barrier. Both Yue and Agarwal cite the need to spend money at many of the places left — like coffee shops and restaurants — as an obstacle for getting together.

Yearning to spend time together however they can, teens turn to digital spaces like social media and online video games. Some turn to AI chatbots.

“You have the entire virtual world open to you and an entire physical world closed to you,” says Skenazy. “What are you going to do?” Agarwal has seen her peers spend anywhere from six to 10 hours a day on screens, she says.

Eventually, for some teens, habits are formed, and the ease of staying home can simply outweigh the desire to leave.

“Even if I say I want to be more social,” says Lance Garrison, dean for the College of Professional Psychology at the Chicago School, “I’ve got this strong pull of a system that’s designed to maximize my engagement, to maximize my time in front of it.”

“It can be really tough to overcome that,” he says.

Ultimately, teens are not only spending less time with each other in person, they’re spending less time with each other — period. The share of 12th graders who visit friends weekly dropped from 88% in the 1980s to 69% in 2024, according to the Institute of Family Studies. And the share of 12th graders who spend a daily hour of leisure alone jumped from 43% in the 1980s to 75% in 2024.

Libraries nationwide are opening or decking out teen centers with podcast and music recording studios, as well as gaming consoles. Organizations like Stanford University’s Center for Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing have helped open youth centers where teens can spend time playing games, studying and attending programming.

Skenazy advocates for keeping schools open late to let kids of all ages hang out even outside of organized activities. Mushlin highlights parks as great third spaces worth investing in. Both Agarwal and Yue have worked with gender equity and child well-being nonprofit California Partners Project on shaping research regarding the importance of physical spaces for teens.

Some parents are taking matters into their own hands and trying to create pseudo third spaces at home. Ontario, Canada-based author of “Hold the Phone: How Parents Can Rescue Their Kids From Too Much Screen Time” Katherine Martinko has three sons 11, 14 and 17 years old. They’ve always loved working out, she says, so she filled their garage with equipment like a pull-up bar, a climbing rope, barbells and a rower.

And “it has become this gathering space, especially for the older teenage boys,” she says. “Kids are always asking to come over and work out.”

For her part, Agarwal is looking forward to a future with more opportunities to spend time with friends. In college, for example, she imagines there will be more spaces to get together. “I definitely envision my social life improving and becoming more active” there, she says.