Adolescent Brains Are Wired to Want Status and Respect: That’s an Opportunity for Teachers and Parents
Adolescent Brains Are Wired to Want Status and Respect: That’s an Opportunity for Teachers and Parents
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This fact sheet gives an overview of adolescent brain development and explains how access to resources, opportunities, and meaningful relationships during adolescence can build connections within our brains and with the world around us that support us into adulthood.
Brain development during adolescence is fundamentally a story of connections.
Around age 9 or 10, hormonal changes kick off a period of intense learning and development, when brain cells form, strengthen, and streamline connections in response to our experiences more rapidly than in any period of life after early childhood.
Activity increases especially in the brain networks that propel us to explore the world, learn from our mistakes, and connect with others in new ways. In turn, these new experiences prompt our brain cells to connect with other neurons in ways that help us adapt to new events and new information. These neural connections become stronger the more we use them, while unused connections are pruned away, helping the brain become more efficient at acquiring and mastering new skills and new ways of thinking.
This brain-building learning happens through direct experiences in our environments and interactive, responsive relationships—with our families and peers, in our classrooms and neighborhoods, in community activities, and even online. The resources, opportunities, and experiences we as adults provide in and out of school can help young people’s brains build the extensive networks of connections that will manage the complex knowledge and behaviors needed to navigate adulthood.
Learning by Exploring the World Around Us
One of the networks that changes significantly with the increase in hormones and dopamine at the beginning of puberty is the “reward system” in our brain. Heightened activity in this system increases the feeling of reward we get from exploring the world, taking risks, and learning from the results.
Meanwhile, the network of brain regions that make up the “social brain” also changes during adolescence. These changes help us tune into social and emotional cues, like facial expressions or social rejection and approval, and increase our desire to earn respect and contribute to others. It also enables us to learn the nuances of changing social contexts in ways that help prepare us for adult relationships.
The prefrontal cortex (the region of the brain that orchestrates critical thinking and behavioral control) undergoes its most rapid period of development during adolescence. It builds on many other systems within the brain to manage our responses to the flood of new information and intensifying emotions. Engaging with other people and our environment and learning from our successes and our mistakes, known as “action-based learning,” helps shape the prefrontal cortex by strengthening the connections within it and between it and other brain networks. We learn through repeated practice—which includes trying and sometimes failing—what is adaptive and appropriate in different situations and how to guide our behavior accordingly, in ways that equip us to pursue new forward-looking goals.
When adults provide youth with opportunities to try new things, to practice navigating emotions, and to learn from failures along the way, it helps build the brain connections that we all need to grow into healthy, thriving adults.
Policies, Experiences, and Mindsets Shape the Connecting Brain
Although we can continue to learn new skills and behaviors as adults, the adaptability of the brain during adolescence means that these connections are much more likely to form quickly in response to experiences. The extent of these changes make the adolescent years a critical window when investments in the right policies and programs for youth can shape long-term positive development.
Likewise, this makes the adolescent years a time when negative experiences including racism, other forms of discrimination, poverty, or abuse can create steeper hills for young people to climb toward a healthy adulthood. When adults ensure that all young people, especially those who have experienced earlier adversity, have what they need along their journey, they can build the skills and capacities they need to thrive as adults. This includes opportunities to explore and take healthy risks, to connect with and contribute to those around us, to make decisions and learn from the outcomes, to develop a healthy sense of identity, and to rely on support from parents or other caring adults.
Understanding how and why the brain develops during adolescence lets us provide the support young people need to build healthy connections—in their world and within their brains—that will help our youth and our communities thrive.
This issue provides an overview of research showcasing the effects of neighborhood environments on adolescent development, the benefits of culturally tailored interventions, the trajectory of executive function development, and links between rumination and neural response to social rejection.
In this issue of our quarterly Research Roundup, we provide an overview of some recent research showcasing the effects of neighborhood environments on adolescent development, the benefits of culturally tailored interventions, the trajectory of executive function development, and links between rumination and neural response to social rejection.
You can suggest research articles for future roundups by emailing CDAinfo@mednet.ucla.edu or sign up to receive the quarterly research roundup in your inbox.
- Exposure to urban greenspace in childhood can benefit attentional abilities in adolescence (October 2023)
- Large-scale datasets highlight mid-adolescence as a key period for the development of executive functions (October 2023)
- Culturally tailored interventions can help improve sexual health in American Indian adolescents (November 2023)
- Exposure to neighborhood poverty in childhood may impact brain network organization in adolescence (December 2023)
- Rumination is linked to altered neural responding and slowed reaction time to social rejection in adolescent girls (December 2023)
Exposure to urban greenspace in childhood can benefit attentional abilities in adolescence
In this study, Despina Bolanis and colleagues explored whether exposure to residential greenspace (such as a tree-filled city park) in childhood relates to mental health outcomes in adolescence. Using longitudinal data from 742 participants, the authors found that youth who reported living in urban areas with more greenspace at age 10 had fewer inattention problems as reported by teachers in adolescence (ages 15 to 17 years). This association remained even when controlling for factors such as family and neighborhood socioeconomic status and prior mental health problems. (Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, October 2023).
Why this is important: These findings point to the impact of physical environments on development, suggesting that increasing greenspace in cities and urban areas may support the development of attentional capacities in adolescence.
A canonical trajectory of executive function maturation from adolescence to adulthood
Adolescence is a key period for the development of goal-directed cognitive abilities—commonly known as executive functions—that are crucial for healthy development and can be impacted in mental health disorders. Understanding the standard pattern of executive function development in adolescence can highlight critical periods for executive function development, which in turn can help identify shifts from these normative patterns that could indicate future difficulties and disorders. In this study, Brandon Tervo-Clemmens and colleagues combined data from multiple large datasets and across various cognitive assessments and tasks to explore the developmental trajectory of executive functions in a group of 10,766 individuals ages 8 to 35 years. The authors found rapid and significant development in executive function from late childhood to mid-adolescence (ages 10 to 15 years), with these complex cognitive abilities reaching their full potential in late adolescence (ages 18 to 20 years). (Nature Communications, October 2023)
Why this is important: This study maps how executive function develops over adolescence, suggesting that ages 10 to 15 are crucial years for executive function development–an understanding that can help inform developmentally appropriate interventions and policies for youth.
Parenting in 2 Worlds: Testing improved parent–adolescent communication about sexuality in Urban American Indian families
In this study, Stephen Kulis and colleagues tested the efficacy of a culturally tailored intervention designed to increase and improve parent-adolescent communication about sexual health in American Indian families. The intervention, called Parenting in 2 Worlds (P2W), combined core components of a traditional parenting program with cultural elements unique to American Indian families. Participants included 575 parents/guardians of American Indian adolescents between the ages of 10 to 17 years living in urban areas of Arizona. The program consisted of 10 lessons covering topics such as building supportive parenting communities, identifying cultural traditions, understanding adolescent development, and fostering communication skills. Importantly, the curriculum emphasized Indigenous cultural heritage as a foundation for raising healthy and resilient adolescents, incorporating values shared by diverse American Indian communities such as notions of kinship and the importance of ritual and traditional language. Compared to interventions not culturally tailored to Indigenous families, P2W produced greater increases in parent-adolescent communication about general sexual health and sexual decision-making. Increases in sexual health communication were strongest for cross-gender dyads (mother and son or father and daughter), while increases in communication about sexual decision-making were strongest for adolescent sons (regardless of parent’s gender). (Journal of Research on Adolescence, November 2023)
Why this is important: This study demonstrates the efficacy of the P2W program for improving sexual health amongst American Indian adolescents, emphasizing the benefits of culturally informed interventions designed specifically for the communities they aim to serve.
Neighborhood poverty during childhood prospectively predicts adolescent functional brain network architecture
In this study, Cleanthis Michael and colleagues examined how exposure to neighborhood poverty in childhood might impact the organization of brain networks in adolescence in a group of 538 twins over the ages of 6 to 19 years. The authors assessed two main aspects of functional brain network organization: network segregation (the degree to which the brain organizes into distinct, functionally specialized networks) and the balance between network segregation and integration (efficiency of information flow between brain networks). Both network segregation and balance increased during adolescence; however, these age-related associations were influenced by exposure to neighborhood poverty in childhood. Children who experienced greater neighborhood disadvantage showed reduced network segregation in adolescence. These effects were observed across various functional networks, emphasizing that neighborhood conditions in childhood may have enduring effects on the organization and development of the adolescent brain. (Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, December 2023)
Why this is important: This study suggests that exposure to neighborhood poverty in childhood can impact functional brain development in adolescence, highlighting the importance of policies and programs aimed at increasing available resources within neighborhoods to support positive development for young people.
Hooked on a thought: Associations between rumination and neural responses to social rejection in adolescent girls
In this study, Leehyun Yoon and colleagues investigated the association between self-reported rumination—persistent negative thought patterns—and neural responding to social rejection in a group of 116 adolescent girls. Participants completed a social evaluation task during which they received (fabricated) feedback in the form of acceptance or rejection from peers they liked or disliked. When rejected by peers they liked, girls with higher rumination levels showed more neural activity in areas of the default mode network, a key brain network for self-related processing. They also showed reduced connectivity between the default mode network and the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex (sgACC), a region implicated in rumination. Higher rumination was linked to slower response times on the task following rejection, and this effect was explained by neural activity during rejection. (Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, December 2023)
Why this is important: These findings link rumination to neural and behavioral response during social rejection, indicating the importance of developing more effective interventions to support the mental health of adolescent girls with high rumination levels.
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Two guides, for practitioners and for funders, help organizations build and support effective, research-informed youth engagement programs that benefit young people and the groups they work with.
High-quality youth engagement within an organization can be an all-around win. Involving young people in research and evaluation improves the quality and relevance of both the research and ultimately the programs, policies, and organizations that serve young people. It also helps youth develop skills that they’ll need to thrive as contributing adults.
The challenge is to engage youth in research in ways that actually create meaningful and effective youth engagement that truly integrates young people’s perspectives and capabilities. This requires planning, appropriate resources, skills, and capacities from the adults facilitating the program.
We recently worked with The Annie E. Casey Foundation to create two guides to help youth-serving organizations and those who fund them to invest in and build the type of meaningful, effective youth engagement programs that help young people and those who work with them succeed.
Including youth as partners in program evaluation is one way to give them voice and increase opportunities for equity. This guide is designed to help organizations partner with young people to evaluate and improve their programs, policies, and services. Young people may also find this guide useful if they have ideas about ways to improve things but don’t know how to get their input heard.
Effective, strategic, meaningful youth engagement has the greatest potential for success. Funders and youth allies who engage in the necessary planning prior to implementation have the greatest chance of working with youth in a way that best serves young people, programs, and organizations, and maximizes the potential for meaningful social change. This guide provides a tool to evaluate the developmental appropriateness of youth-engaged research and evaluation strategies.
In this online panel discussion, the creators of UCLA CDA’s recently released youth-engagement guides discussed how funders and youth-serving organizations can invest in and build youth-engagement programs that help young people and those who work with them succeed.