Actually, during the 1980s, it was the teens that made the malls thrive. Kids were better behaved then, at least in suburbia. Nobody had cell phones or internet. Parents would drop them off in early afternoon and pick them up later at night, by a massive bank of pay phones that they had outside on either end of the mall.
During that time, the kids would visit the arcade to play the early games like PacMan and Space Invaders. They'd take in a movie, something like "Back To The Future" or "Ghostbusters." They'd hang out at The Gap trying on tight jeans and then walking out without buying anything to the chagrin of the clerks. They'd hang out at Radio Shack, driving the clerk crazy with questions about this or that boombox or stereo component. Back then, the clerks were knowledgeable and had the answers but if you bought so much as a battery, you'd have to fill out a three-ply carbon form with your address, with the pink copy going to you, the white copy being retained by the store, and the canary copy going to corporate, where they'd put you on their mailing list so you could get 17 catalogs mailed to you each year.
Of course the Food Court was the main hangout for the teens, where they would get a frothy Orange Julius (with two straws if you had a date sharing it). They had a place selling huge pretzels for fifty cents. Or if you wanted to get super fancy with your date, they had an Au Bon Pain where you could get one of those French croissants.
My favorite place was the news stand where they had pretty much ever magazine then in existence. If you lingered too long, a clerk would come by to remind you that "this is not a library."
Teens worked at the mall, too. Back then, I had a few mall jobs. I miss the malls of yesteryear.