10 Facts on Teen’s Brain That Every Parent Should Know
Amazing Facts on Teen’s Brain
Brain Facts
Inside
the Teen mind
They are dramatic, irrational and scream for seemingly no
reason. And they have a deep need for both greater independence and tender
loving care.
There is a reason this description could be used for either
teens or toddlers: After infancy, the brain's most dramatic growth spurt occurs
in adolescence.
Here
are 10 facts every parent should know.
1. Critical
period of development
Loosely defined as the years between 11 and 19, adolescence
is considered a critical time of development – and not just in outward
appearances.
"The brain continues to change throughout life, but
there are huge leaps in development during adolescence," said Sara
Johnson, an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public
Health who reviewed the neuroscience in The Teen Years Explained: A Guide to
Healthy Adolescent Development (Johns Hopkins University, 2009) by Clea McNeely
and Jayne Blanchard.
And just as a teen may go through an awkward growth spurt,
new cognitive skills and competencies may come in leaps and stutters, said
Sheryl Feinstein, author of Inside the Teenage Brain: Parenting a Work in
Progress (Rowman and Littlefield, 2009.)
Parents should understand that no matter how tall their son
has sprouted or how grown-up their daughter dresses, "they are still in a
developmental period that will affect the rest of their life,"
2. Blossoming
brain
Scientists used to think only infants have an overabundance
of neuronal connections, which are "pruned" into a more efficient
arrangement over the first three years of life.
But brain imaging studies, such as one published in 1999 in
Nature Neuroscience, have discovered that a second burst of neuronal sprouting
happens right before puberty, peaking at about age 11 for girls and 12 for
boys.
The adolescent's experiences – from reading vampire novels
to learning to drive – shape this new grey matter, mostly following a "use
it or lose it" strategy, Johnson said. The structural reorganization is
thought to continue until the age of 25, and smaller changes continue
throughout life.
3. New
thinking skills
Due to the increase in brain matter, the teen brain becomes
more interconnected and gains processing power, Johnson said.
Adolescents start to have the computational and
decision-making skills of an adult –if given time and access to information,
she said.
But in the heat of the moment, their decision-making can be
overly influenced by emotions, because their brains rely more on the limbic
system (the emotional seat of the brain) than the more rational prefrontal
cortex, explained Feinstein.
"This duality of adolescent competence can be very
confusing for parents," Johnson said, meaning that sometimes teens do
things, like punch a wall or drive too fast, when, if asked, they clearly know
better.
4. Teen
tantrums
Adolescents are in the midst of acquiring incredible new
skills sets, especially when it comes to social behavior and abstract thought.
But they are not good at using them yet, so they must
experiment – and sometimes they use their parents as guinea pigs. Many kids
this age view conflict as a type of self-expression and may have trouble
focusing on an abstract idea or understanding another's point of view.
Just as when dealing with the tantrums of toddlerhood,
parents need to remember their teen's behavior is "not a personal affront,"
Johnson said.
They are dealing with a huge amount of social, emotional and
cognitive flux and have underdeveloped abilities to cope. They need their
parents – those people with the more stable adult brain – to help them by
staying calm, listening and being good role models.
5. Intense
emotions
"Puberty is the beginning of major changes in the
limbic system," Johnson said, referring to the part of the brain that not
only helps regulate heart rate and blood sugar levels, but also is critical to
the formation of memories and emotions.
Part of the limbic system, the amygdala is thought to
connect sensory information to emotional responses. Its development, along with
hormonal changes, may give rise to newly intense experiences of rage, fear,
aggression (including towards oneself), excitement and sexual attraction.
Over the course of adolescence, the limbic system comes
under greater control of the prefrontal cortex, the area just behind the
forehead, which is associated with planning, impulse control and higher order
thought.
As additional areas of the brain start to help process
emotion, older teens gain some equilibrium and have an easier time interpreting
others. But until then, they often misread teachers and parents, Feinstein
said.
"You can be as careful as possible and you still will
have tears or anger at times because they will have misunderstood what you have
said," she said.
6. Peer
pleasure
As teens become better at thinking abstractly, their social
anxiety increases, according to research in the Annals of the New York Academy
of Sciences published in 2004.
Abstract reasoning makes it possible to consider yourself
from the eyes of another. Teens may use this new skill to ruminate about what
others are thinking of them. In particular, peer approval has been shown to be
highly rewarding to the teen brain, Johnson said, which may be why teens are
more likely to take risks when other teens are around.
"Kids are really concerned with looking cool – but you
don't need brain research to tell you that," she said.
Friends also provide teens with opportunities to learn
skills such as negotiating, compromise and group planning. "They are
practicing adult social skills in a safe setting and they are really not good
at it at first," Feinstein said. So even if all they do is sit around with
their friends, teens are hard at work acquiring important life skills.
7. Measuring
risk
"The brakes come online somewhat later than the
accelerator of the brain," said Johnson, referring to the development of
the prefrontal cortex and the limbic system respectively.
At the same time, "teens need higher doses of risk to
feel the same amount of rush adults do," Johnson said.
Taken together, these changes may make teens vulnerable to
engaging in risky behaviors, such as trying drugs, getting into fights or
jumping into unsafe water. By late adolescence, say 17 years old and after, the
part of the brain responsible for impulse control and long-term perspective
taking is thought to help them reign in some of the behavior they were tempted
by in middle adolescence, according to McNeely and Blanchard.
What is a parent to do in the meantime? "Continue to
parent your child." Johnson said. Like all children, "teens have
specific developmental vulnerabilities and they need parents to limit their
behavior," she said.
Research on the different rates of brain function
development during adolescence was published in the journal Developmental
Review in 2008.
8. Parents
are still important
According to Feinstein, a survey of teenagers revealed that
84 percent think highly of their mothers and 89 percent think highly of their
fathers. And more than three-quarters of teenagers enjoy spending time with
their parents; 79 percent enjoy hanging out with Mom and 76 percent like
chilling with Dad.
One of the tasks of adolescence is separating from the
family and establishing some autonomy, Feinstein said, but that does not mean a
teen no longer needs parents – even if they say otherwise.
"They still need some structure and are looking to
their parents to provide that structure," she said. "The parent that
decides to treat a 16 or 17 year old as an adult is behaving unfairly and
setting them up for failure."
One of the most influential ways to parent your teen, in
addition to being a good listener, is to be a good role model, especially when
dealing with stress and other life difficulties, as teens are actively trying
to figure out their own coping strategies.
"Your adolescent is watching you," Feinstein said.
9. Need
more zzzzzzzs
It is a myth that teens need less sleep than young children.
They need 9 to 10 hours a night, although most fall short. Part of the problem
is a shift in circadian rhythms during adolescence: It makes sense to teen
bodies to get up later and stay up later, Johnson said.
But due to early bussing and class schedules, many teens
rack up sleep debt and "become increasingly cognitively impaired across
the week," Johnson said. Sleep-deprivation only exacerbates moodiness and
cloudy decision-making. And sleep is thought to aid the critical reorganization
of the teen brain.
"There is a disconnect between teen bodies and our
schedules," Johnson said.
10. I
am the center of the universe -- and this universe is not good enough!
The hormone changes at puberty have huge affects on the
brain, one of which is to spur the production of more receptors for oxytocin,
according to a 2008 issue of the journal Developmental Review.
While oxytocin is often described as the "bonding
hormone," increased sensitivity to its effects in the limbic system has
also been linked to feeling self-consciousness, making an adolescent truly feel
like everyone is watching him or her. According to McNeely and Blanchard, these
feelings peak around 15 years old.
While this may make a teen seem self-centered (and in their
defense, they do have a lot going on), the changes in the teen brain may also
spur some of the more idealistic efforts tackled by young people throughout
history.
"It is the first time they are seeing themselves in the
world," Johnson said, meaning their greater autonomy has opened their eyes
to what lies beyond their families and schools. They are asking themselves, she
continued, for perhaps the first time: What kind of person do I want to be and
what type of place do I want the world to be?
Until their brains develop enough to handle shades of grey,
their answers to these questions can be quite one-sided, Feinstein said, but
the parents' job is to help them explore the questions, rather than give them
answers.
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