Institute for Money, Technology & Financial Inclusion

This article is based on a study conducted in Nigerian Christian and Muslim neighborhoods on the intrigues that characterized adults-adolescent girls’ relations about how and when adolescent girls could use smart phones. Questionnaires, ethnographic interviews, school debates, observations, and focus group discussion methods were used to study the influence of smart phones on adolescent girls’ identity construction, adults-adolescent girls’ tension as regards ownership and use of smartphones, and new dynamics in adolescent girls-male friends’ relationship caused by smart phone uptake. For this population, smart phones display contextual symbolism that transcends their technological meaning, shifting girls’ social dependence from adults to peers and technology. Smart phone use has given adolescent girls a new way of identity construction, empowered them subtly in sexuality negotiation and assigned new roles to them. Adults’ concern about adolescent girls’ use of smart phones is rooted in their fears about the possible negative influences of smart phone use, which they see as entertainment driven and inimical to adolescent girls’ development. Findings of this study revealed that tensions between adults and adolescent girls over smart phone uptake originated from role reversal and expectation-laden nature of smart phones acquired by male friends, which effective mutual sharing of knowledge and resources could address. Adolescent girls should justify their craving for smart phones morally, socially, and psychologically. Adults and social institutions also need to rediscover their new roles in a world where digital innovations are necessities.