It’s not just hormones that kick in during adolescence, the brain also undergoes massive development which might help to explain teenage behavior, a British scientist said Thursday.
Until recently it was assumed that the brain stopped developing before puberty, but new research shows there are changes in areas of the brain linked to decision-making, planning and social awareness in adolescence.
“What this brain imaging data ... suggests is that it is just not hormones that are causing teenagers to be their typical selves it could also be the fact that their brains are developing as well,” said Dr. Sarah Blakemore, a neuroscientist at University College London.
“Their brains are works in progress at age 16,” she added.
Blakemore and her team did functional MRI scans of the brains of adolescents and young adults who were told to think about their own intentions, such as wanting to go to the cinema and what they needed to do.
“We know that kind of task involves the prefrontal cortex,” Blakemore said, referring to a region of the brain involved in understanding other people and social cognition.
She found that a network of brain areas are used. The prefrontal cortex activity involved in the task increased with age while use in a region in the back of the brain declined. Adults used the prefrontal cortex more than adolescents.
“It is as if the pattern of brain activity shifts from the back of the brain to the front of the brain during adolescence to do these kinds of empathy tasks,” Blakemore said at the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting.
In a second study that analyzed the development of perspective, she asked 150 adolescents to make decisions about how they would feel and how other people would feel in certain situations.
“We found that that decision-making process became quicker with age. It suggests that the ability to take someone else’s perspective is refined with age. It becomes more efficient,” she explained.
Blakemore said there is no obvious time at which the brain stops developing and there are probably differences in individuals.
“This research is showing that after puberty there is a whole new wave of development,” she added.