Wednesday, May 21, 2003

Teen misdeeds: Hormones, hobgoblins, adolescent brains

By STEPHEN WALLACE

Parents everywhere are no doubt puzzling over recent high profile displays of horrific adolescent behavior, fearing for their own children and wondering what in the world is going on. Let's take a look:

Northbrook, Ill.: Fueled by alcohol, a gang of twelth grade girls lead a violent, demeaning hazing of their eleventh grade classmates, punching and kicking them, covering them with feces and forcing them to eat dirt and pig intestines.

Sarasota, Fla.: Influenced by the movie "Jackass," three trespassing teens leap from atop a condominium building aiming for the pool. Two make it. One hits the side, fracturing both legs and an arm and cracking his pelvis.

Red Lion, Penn.: Brandishing his stepfather's 44-caliber magnum, an eighth grade boy stands up in his school's cafeteria and shoots the principal in the chest, killing him. He then uses a 22-caliber weapon to kill himself.

Kingston, Mass.: Cheered on by classmates, an eighth grade girl engages in a sex act with a tenth grade boy on the school bus.

Just as figuring out the implausible seems all the more impossible, information is emerging about some serious neurological rewiring taking place during adolescence. In her new book, "The Primal Teen," Barbara Strauch illuminates startling advances in science that may help to explain teen behavior heretofore chalked up simply to immaturity, hormones or hobgoblins.

Recent research at UCLA's Lab of Neuro Imaging suggests that, during adolescence, boys and girls undergo significant neuronal transformation, affecting such functions as self-control, emotional regulation, organization and planning.

This research, in tandem with studies performed at the National Institute of Mental Health and at McLean Hospital in Massachusetts, challenges traditional thinking that brain development is complete by age 8 or 10. Now, some quixotic adolescent behaviors are being linked to a natural, even predictable, neurochemical process.

Of course, this doesn't mean that teens are scientifically destined to make poor choices. But it may mean that they are even more predisposed to do so than previously thought.

Why? Because the massive reorganization of gray matter at puberty seems to impact areas of the brain most closely associated with judgment. And judgment shades choices.

Understanding the antecedents of those choices, be they biological, chemical or social, underscores the value of parental involvement in teen decision-making and best positions adults to short circuit destructive teen behavior, or at least to try their hand at persuasion.

A calm, clear voice of reason can go a long way toward slowing speeding synapse-driven impulsions if not, at least occasionally, substituting adult judgment for adolescent enterprise.

Perhaps most important in helping young people identify sensible solutions to life's challenges is defining the potential short-term and long-term consequences of behaviors, consequences their still-evolving brains may not yet fully embrace or even slow down long enough to notice.

This can be especially the case when the behavior includes alcohol and other drugs. After all, the flip side of the effects of neurological development on teen behavior is the effect of teen behavior on neurological development. It's not too hard to imagine the impact of substance use and abuse, not to mention scores of other unhealthy experiences, on a transforming cerebral cortex.

While that impact may be hard to see, there are other more immediate, and more identifiable, ramifications of alcohol and drug use. Both have been repeatedly linked to increased rates of automobile crash deaths, risky sexual behavior, sexual assaults, depression, suicide and declining school performance.

Try as we might, we will never successfully transform teen thoughts and actions into those that mirror our own. Nature has a different plan (something Strauch calls "crazy by design"). The best we can do is to drill deeper into the adolescent brain and psyche seeking to understand what drives their decisions and what influencers can be brought to bear to keep them safe and alive. And there's no time like the present.

According to original Teens Today research conducted by SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions/Students Against Driving Drunk) and Liberty Mutual Group:

A majority of teens (63 percent) say they drink, including 16 percent of sixth graders, 41 percent of eighth graders and 75 percent of eleventh graders;

More than one-third of teens (35 percent) say they use drugs, including 34 percent of ninth graders and 42 percent of tenth graders;

More than one-half of teens (58 percent) say they have engaged in sexual activity, including 35 percent of seventh graders and 78 percent of twelfth graders.

Still, most young people want to make good decisions. And, believe it or not, they welcome, and respond to, parents who help them translate illogical thought into responsible action. The Teens Today research revealed that adolescents want parents to offer their opinions; say it is important to them to live up to their parents' expectations regarding drinking, drug use, and sex; and are much less likely to engage in destructive behavior when they share a close, open relationship with their parents.

Recent events around the country make clear that our work is cut out for us. As one of the pool-plunging Sarasota teens told the Associated Press, "It's adolescent independence and taking risks, like kids taking drugs or doing pot. Adolescence comes with stupidity and arrogance." At least now we're closer to knowing why.

[Stephen Wallace is a psychologist and the national chairman and chief executive officer of SADD, Inc. SADD sponsors school-based education and prevention programs nationwide and makes available at no charge the SADD Contract for Life and the Opening Lifesaving Lines brochure, both designed to facilitate effective parent-child communication. Toll-free: 877-SADD-INC. For more information on the SADD/Liberty Mutual Teens Today research, visit http://www.saddonline.com or http://www.libertymutualinsurance.com.]