Review - Development of the adolescent brain: implications for executive function and social cognition.
Link to article:
file:///Users/matt/Downloads/Blakemore_et_al-2006-Journal_of_Child_Psychology_and_Psychiatry.pdf
This article focuses on the advent of fMRI technology and its contributions to the advancement of this relatively new method of study. Previously, adolescent brain development was only able to be studied by way of animal testing and observing dead bodies. fMRI has been around long enough now that the same subjects, in large quantity, have been tracked for over 20 years, providing us with a more cohesive picture of brain development throughout various stages of growth (childhood, adolescence, adulthood).
This article, like others, makes a strong case for integrating more of our recent findings on adolescent development into our legal system. Our legal system tends to want to to make an oversimplified, liner means of discipline when dealing with adolescents, whereas fMRI studying is hi lighting sophisticated, nuanced variance in adolescent behavior that are highly sensitive to context and individual neurological stages of development.
While this article focuses mostly on research in developmental cognitive neuroscience, the authors are quick to acknowledge that a more rich and multi-varied approach is necessary to understand the complexities of this field such as genetics, brain structure, physiology and chemistry and the environment.
One of the things that I am finding to be consistent in all of these articles is that fMRI technology is indispensable when discussing adolescent brain development. It is providing us with the most up-to date research methods and findings that have been around long enough to provide us with a dense multitude of data, yet is is still relatively new. Some of the findings of adolescent brain development, such as the fact that the pre-frontal cortex doesn't fully form until 24-25 years of age, have not yet incited shifts in the mainstream perceptions. For example, legally, you are an adult when you are 18. I also have to speculate that we might have to radically shift the way we think collegiate institutions should be run. My hunch is that a more robust integration of executive functioning skills training in undergraduate classes would drastically improve the quality of the student's lives, and their mental functioning capabilities. Some of these studies suggest that higher functioning brains don't necessarily understand more information, but they do process information quicker. Quickly processing information and quickly translating that information into practical action is perhaps the most important skill in becoming an effective adult.
References:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2006.01611.x
file:///Users/matt/Downloads/Blakemore_et_al-2006-Journal_of_Child_Psychology_and_Psychiatry.pdf
This article focuses on the advent of fMRI technology and its contributions to the advancement of this relatively new method of study. Previously, adolescent brain development was only able to be studied by way of animal testing and observing dead bodies. fMRI has been around long enough now that the same subjects, in large quantity, have been tracked for over 20 years, providing us with a more cohesive picture of brain development throughout various stages of growth (childhood, adolescence, adulthood).
This article, like others, makes a strong case for integrating more of our recent findings on adolescent development into our legal system. Our legal system tends to want to to make an oversimplified, liner means of discipline when dealing with adolescents, whereas fMRI studying is hi lighting sophisticated, nuanced variance in adolescent behavior that are highly sensitive to context and individual neurological stages of development.
While this article focuses mostly on research in developmental cognitive neuroscience, the authors are quick to acknowledge that a more rich and multi-varied approach is necessary to understand the complexities of this field such as genetics, brain structure, physiology and chemistry and the environment.
One of the things that I am finding to be consistent in all of these articles is that fMRI technology is indispensable when discussing adolescent brain development. It is providing us with the most up-to date research methods and findings that have been around long enough to provide us with a dense multitude of data, yet is is still relatively new. Some of the findings of adolescent brain development, such as the fact that the pre-frontal cortex doesn't fully form until 24-25 years of age, have not yet incited shifts in the mainstream perceptions. For example, legally, you are an adult when you are 18. I also have to speculate that we might have to radically shift the way we think collegiate institutions should be run. My hunch is that a more robust integration of executive functioning skills training in undergraduate classes would drastically improve the quality of the student's lives, and their mental functioning capabilities. Some of these studies suggest that higher functioning brains don't necessarily understand more information, but they do process information quicker. Quickly processing information and quickly translating that information into practical action is perhaps the most important skill in becoming an effective adult.
References:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2006.01611.x
Comments
Post a Comment