“Why are there so many mean, cheating, cussing, crazy students at school, Dad?” This is how my most recent discussion with my 14 year old son started the other day. I went on to explain to him one of the reasons why teens are impulsive, risky, rude, ‘crazy’, get in car accidents, experimented with illicit drugs, and talk about and have sex. Answer: overactive nucleus accumbens & not enough prefrontal cortex. “Ugh, Dad.”

It turns out that a brain area known as the nucleus accumbens is VERY active in teens and is the area of the brain associated with the processing of rewards aka sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll. On the flip side, the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that helps us resist such temptations & is essential in our ability to make rational choices, is less developed in teens. In fact it has been shown that kids with ADHD have an immature prefrontal cortex (studies have shown that this immature prefrontal cortex eventually catches up to its peers with about a 3 year lag time).

So teens nucleus accumbens is more active than their prefrontal cortex, but as they develop into their early 20’s, there prefrontal cortex (usually & hopefully) becomes more active than their nucleus accumbens. Thus we see what we call maturity. We also see more rational choices, less car accidents, less impulsive & risky behavior.

You see, son, science can be helpful & fun…

(information based on a book: How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer)