Blog

The Realties of Teenage Temptations

As Dr. Daniel Siegel states in his book, Brainstorm, adolescence is a time where novelty, creativity, social connection and emotional intensity are in the forefront.  The good news is that these areas can be channelled into positive paths.  As a parent, it’s important to work with these four areas, versus trying to block them.  Dr. Siegel prescribes a daily dose of the “healthy mind platter” consisting of sleep time (at least 9 hours for a teenager), physical time, focus time, connecting time, playtime, downtime and time-in (inner reflection).

When Novelty Turns to Addiction…

Scientists have discovered that the teenage brain is highly sensitive to learning new information.  By having repeated exposure to new information, the brain is stimulated and enhances a synapse.  (Information can now be passed quicker from one neuron to another, thus creating  a more efficient brain.)  However, this same pattern happens with addiction.  Addiction is also a form of learning as there’s also repeated exposure, only this time it’s to a substance, and not in the learning area of the brain, but the reward-seeking area of the brain.  The teenage brain is therefore also more “efficient” at becoming addicted.  Therefore, it’s really important for teenagers to know this about their brain.

Dr. Frances Jensen (Professor and Chair of the Dept. of Neurology, University of Pennsylvania)  has written a book called, The Teenage Brain.  She states that:

• Binge drinking can actually kill brain cells in the adolescent brain where it does not to the same extent in the adult brain
• Because the teenage brain has more plasticity, drugs lock onto more “targets” in their brains, stay “locked” on to the “targets” longer than in an adult brain, and therefore block the process of learning and memory
• Substance abuse can make teens more vulnerable to mental illness
• Smoking appears to damage the parts of the brain that produce serotonin and lower levels of serotonin are linked to depression
• Regular marijuana use in adolescence has been linked to smaller brain volume and more damage to white matter.  Their MRIs look different when they’re imaged during a task
• Alcohol can cause damage to the hippocampus (the memory centre of the brain)
• Regular marijuana use for a year or more, during the ages of 13-17yrs. has shown a decrease in Verbal IQ

Chronic Stress and Teenage Brain Development

The Macleans Magazine article on The Shrinking Teenage Brain (Jan. 2015) also states that chronic stress is permanently affecting teenage brain development.  The stress increases the size of the amygdala (the governing emotion centre and “alarm centre” of the brain).  Meanwhile, the stress decreases the size of the hippocampus – the long term memory centre of the brain.

Video Games and Teenage Brain Development

The article continues to say that “excessive gaming appears to enlarge areas responsible for memory and visual-spatial skills, but shrinks areas of the brain responsible for speech, memory, emotions, and areas responsible for inhibiting impulsive behaviour”.

Different Views on Parenting Styles with Adolescents

Amy Chua, otherwise known as “Tiger Mom”  and Yale Professor, is a proponent of the be strict, with more rules, and “Do as I say!” approach.

Frances Jensen (mentioned above) believes in the “Highly-Involved Parent approach”.  She states:  “Be your teen’s frontal lobes” and “try to think for your teenage sons and daughters until their own brains are ready to take over the job.”  She believes that parents should protect their children from their own short-sighted thinking, while allowing them “safe failures”.

Meanwhile, psychologist and author, Robert Epstein, author of  The Case Against Adolescence: Rediscovering the Adult in Every Teen, believes that teens rebel because their parents are too involved, and therefore he parents his own teens by giving them the freedom to make most of their own decisions.

As always, I don’t believe there is a “cookie cutter” approach.  Every child/teenage is unique.  Some children, who may be struggling with learning disabilities, learning difficulties such as ADHD or mental health issues such as anxiety, are going to have different needs.  I consider support to be scaffolding.  As parents, I believe we need to help set up the scaffolding, and then monitor.  It’s important for our children to “fall” or experience emotional distress, in order that they have a good cry and learn that they will get through it.  However, repeated failure is not going to increase resilience.  In fact, repeated failure is going to  lower self-esteem and create a sense of hopelessness.  If we can be attuned to our child/teen and recognize when they may need more help (such as when they’re sick or distressed) and when they may be very capable of making their own decisions, we will be able to allow our parent-child connected relationship guide the amount of freedom within the boundary of being responsible.

With freedom, comes responsibilities

~ Alyson Schafer – Family therapist and author of Honey I Wrecked the Kids

I also believe that…

Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family.
~ Kofi Annan

By encouraging our tweens and teens to learn more about their brains, they can be informed to make better choices.  Perhaps having a copy of the Macleans’s magazine on the Teenage Shrinking Brain or the books, Brainstorm or The Teenage Brain lying around your house will peek your adolescent’s interest?

Happy BC Family Day Weekend to you and your family,

Warmly,