Why do otherwise good kids seem to make bad decisions when they are with their friends? New research on risk taking and the teenage brain offers some answers.
In studies at Temple University, psychologists used functional magnetic resonance imaging scans on 40 teenagers and adults to determine if there are differences in brain activity when adolescents are alone versus with their friends. The findings suggest that teenage peer pressure has a distinct effect on brain signals involving risk and reward, helping to explain why young people are more likely to misbehave and take risks when their friends are watching.
Oy vey! Yet another epiphany of the perfectly obvious and completely well known. L
2.
Who cares? It was blindingly obvious all along. I’m with Larry.
True, it’s a well-known (but now objectively documented) fact. As the mom of a college-bound kid, it’s something I worry and pray about daily.
I guess there is more truth than I ever thought in my having long claimed that I was born a [i]stodgy curmudgeon[/i]. My instinctive reaction to most risky behavior throughout my life has been aversion, irrespective of the presence or absence of peers. I also have other personality traits that are consistent with the possibility, perhaps my brain is somehow “wired differently” than most other people’s.
[i]Pax et bonum[/i],
Keith Töpfer