Page 19 - IFV Issue 12 2022

Today’s Child

into play. However, it’s also a time They often challenge authority and neurotransmitters such as serotonin
when teenagers are experimenting; boundaries. Yet they crave approval (one of the feelgood hormones), GABA
they are often judged for risky from the adults in their lives as well and cortisol, which affect mood.
behaviour and for being impulsive and as their peers. This period of conflict There is also the matter of sleep. It
irritable. This behaviour is attributed is normal and may be less evident in has been extensively researched and
to raging hormones, an increased sex teens with stronger self-esteem who reported that teens have a different
drive and immaturity. come from stable, supportive homes body clock to adults and require
Teenagers feel misunderstood where the communication channels far more sleep. This is because their
and isolated. Their turmoil is often are open. melatonin (a hormone made in the
ridiculed. As neuroscientist Sarah- How teens interpret their body that regulates sleep cycles) rises
Jayne Blakemore, author of Inventing world is based on their changing and falls later in the day than in adults.
Ourselves: The Secret Life of the social environment, the physical This explains teens being able to party
Teenage Brain, says: “It is not socially transformation their bodies undergo till the early hours of the morning.
acceptable to mock and demonise and the shifting expectations placed
other sectors of society ... but it is on them. These can contribute to BRAIN DEVELOPMENT
strangely acceptable to mock and them feeling alienated. From the day we are born and
demonise teenagers.” Mood swings can be explained by throughout our childhood, the
On the one hand, teens seem to the interplay of psychological and brain builds connections between
be doing all they can to separate physiological processes associated neurons. It then starts to prune back
themselves from their families in an with maturing. Teenagers experience (remove) redundant neural pathways,
effort to assert their independence. greater fluctuations in hormones and allowing for more efficient networks.

The Villager • Issue 12 2022 • 17