THOSE KIDS!

[Note:  This posting is the fourth of a series of postings regarding adolescence.  The reader is invited to click on the previous three postings – and any other postings – that lead to the content of this one.]

If one doubts the high jinx adolescents are apt to perform or indulge in, one can just pick up any copy of their local newspaper and read a story describing mayhem or near mayhem involving a teenager or group of them.  It can be a petty crime, some altercation, or otherwise mischief causing harm to members of the community.  Sometimes the acts can be attributed to drinking, recklessness, irresponsible driving, and/or drug use.  All of it, by any consideration, can be considered risky behavior.

          Then there are those unreported cases but can have long lasting consequences.  Of course, common examples are derived from engaging in unprotected sex.  Sex becomes a new source of intense drive among this age group.  Beyond the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases, many family stories have been shaped by an unexpected pregnancy and subsequent birth of a baby out of wedlock or one out of an ill-conceived marriage.  Sometimes the results are happy, but sometimes, even often, they are not.

          Unwanted births often lead to unwanted children or so defenders of abortion rights have argued.  They have cited evidence tying legalized abortion to a drop in crime rates.[1]  This indicates a social cost to unwanted pregnancies.  Surely, this argument – associating abortion with the drop in crime – can be questioned, but it does reflect on how what is generally considered a private course of behavior can have meaningful consequences to a community or a nation.  Add to this, the correlated potential of how unprotective sex has been associated with parental abuse and low rates of parental support.[2] 

And that does not even consider the personal consequences such as an education being cut short because a mother takes care of a newborn without the help of the baby’s father.  Or how such an event captures what should have been the rewarding years of a retired grandparent(s) – this writer has seen this development in more than one household.

Psychologically, one can ask:  are adolescents more prone to engage in risk-taking behavior, as compared to adults?  In line with this question is:  are the cognitive and emotional processes similar or different from adults or are adolescents simply not as skilled in managing risk? 

This last question brings up the argument that the only difference between adults and say teenagers is the goals and aims each group strives to attain.  The difference is not what each member of said group attempts to do, but over what he/she is attempting to accomplish.  The difference, it can be hypothesized, is over the aims not the processes or the physical elements of the brain.

There is evidence supporting this hypothesis and it is provided by a study guided by behavioral theory.  That is, the study found that youngsters demonstrate that they give more importance to positive results – rewards – then do adults.  Of heightened attraction are rewards one can categorize as social.[3]  But this not a simple matter.  Quoting Dustin Albert and Lawrence Steinberg in the cited article, “[s]tated simply, adolescent decision making is a complex and multiply [sic] determined phenomena.”[4]

This sort of findings seems to indicate that there is little or no difference in ways risks are seen and that the difference lies with what is valued.  Different values lead to different conclusions as to what to do.  And if one considers that behavior is the product of a long evolutionary process – one occupied by surviving in nomadic, scavenger groupings – this risk-taking proclivity might have served to attract sought after mates in more primitive settings.[5]

This mate choosing function can be one of many factors – such as impulsivity, peer presence, ability beliefs, desire for thrills, peer influences, competitiveness, and personal interests – that encourage a youngster to take a risk in performing some behavior.[6]  These factors can take many forms.

For example, surviving risky situations adds to some young people’s confidence in their abilities and letting them and others believe they are ready to leave their parents’ protection or domicile.  In a given group, having this more risk-taking members in their midst can balance out those who are more conservative; the first willing to try new things and ways of behaving, the second preserving the derived “wisdom” of what has gone before a given challenge makes its presence known.

The idea of wisdom will shortly be revisited, but first a word or two concerning inhibition or the lack of it.  Researchers have investigated how adolescents are apt to fall into undesirable patterns of behavior if they are not continuously held accountable.  Behavioralists call this extinction learning. 

Most people know how the initial experiments in behavioral study – Pavlov’s using a bell to introduce food to a dog that has the dog salivate and after repetition having the dog salivate without the food – but might ask:  what happens after repetition without the food?  Eventually the dog stops salivating.  This is called extinction learning.  Apparently, teenagers are prone to readily ignore what they have learned especially if the lesson is distasteful.[7]

In turn, when the lesson to be learned has to do with risk, the inhibitions to performing the unwanted behavior can more readily reappear.  At times, these behaviors can be associated, for example, with danger, and so a recurrence of it can have serious consequences.  Behaviors such as unprotected sex or the use of illicit drugs can readily lead to serious trouble even if the youngster is not initially caught breaking the rules against such behaviors.[8]  The challenge of parenting an adolescence can seem to never end.

          And now a quick word on wisdom.  To begin, wisdom is not intelligence, at least as intelligence is measured by IQ tests – without appropriate training, adolescents do not improve, relative to others, on those tests.  But they can improve on their ability to conjure up insights and exhibit better judgments.  Experience does help youngsters in doing these things better.[9]

          And with that bit of information, this series on adolescence comes to an end.  Hopefully, especially if he/she is a civics teacher, the reader can gain useful information that can be applied when dealing with that age group.  Civic responsibilities call on a certain level of maturity and immature characteristic in students can be obstacles in getting those students to learn and appreciate what goes into being a good citizen.

          Oh, as a parting shot, if a reader who would like to read (or see) a real world example of what these posting say about maturing or being immature (including extinction learning), a classic example is conveyed by an episode of Baseball, the Ken Burns’ series on PBS.  That example is of the life of Babe Ruth.  There is a man who set a slew of records while consuming not performance enhancing drugs, but consuming performance inhibiting drugs.  He was made for baseball but exhibited repeatedly the types of behaviors one associates with adolescence.[10]

---

[1] Robert J. Barro, “Does abortion Lower the Crime Rate,” Business Week, September 7, 1999, 30, online cite accessed January 16, 2020, https://scholar.harvard.edu/barro/files/99_0927_crimerate_bw.pdf .

[2] Tom Luster and Stephen A. Small, “Factors Associated with Sexual Risk Taking Behaviors among Adolescents,” Journal of Marriage and Family, 46, 3, 622-632, online access to article accessed January 16, 2020, https://www.jstor.org/stable/352873?origin=crossref&seq=1 .  This article goes on to emphasize the occurrence of transmission of sexually transmitted diseases that have a personal toll and a toll on the community.

[3] Dustin Albert and Lawrence Steinberg, “Judgement and Decision Making in Adolescence,” Journal of Research on Adolescence, 21, 1, 211-224, online cite accessed January 16, 2020, http://repository.brynmawr.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1053&context=psych_pubs .

[4] Ibid., 4.

[5] Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works (New York, NY:  W. W. Norton and Company, 1997).

[6] David C. Miller and James P. Byrnes, “The Role of Contextual and Personal Factors in Children’s Risk Taking,” Developing Psychology, 33, 5, 814-823, online abstract accessed January 16, 2020, https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0012-1649.33.5.814 .

[7] Jessica McCullum, Jee Hyun Kim, and Rick Richardson, “Impaired Extinction Retention in Adolescent Rats:  Effects of D-Cycloserine,” Neurosychopharmacolony, 35, 10 (September 2010), 2134-2142, online rendition accessed January 16, 2020, https://www.nature.com/articles/npp201092 .  Yes, the title refers to rats.  Teenagers are not rats, but this article informs one as follows:  “The developmental trajectory of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) in both rats and humans is nonlinear, with a notable decline in synaptic density during adolescence, potentially creating a ‘natural lesion' preparation at this age.”  This condition leads to extinction learning in both adolescents and rats.

[8] Linda Patia Spear, “Adolescent Neurodevelopment,” Journal Adolescent Health, 52, 202 (February 2013), online rendition accessed January 16, 2020, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3982854/ .  Of note, this type of research (for example, this citation and the previous one) reverts to neurological factors and that fact diminishes the claim that teenagers and adults share the same basic brain physical (structural and chemical) elements.

[9] Moisha Pasupathi, Ursula M. Staudinger, and Paul B. Baltes, “Seeds of Wisdom:  Adolescents’ Knowledge and Judgment about Difficult Life Problems,” Development Psychology, 37, 3, 351-361, abstract accessed January 16, 2020, https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0012-1649.37.3.351 .

[10] Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns, Baseball:  An Illustrated History (New York, NY:  Alfred A. Knopf, 1994) AND Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, Baseball:  A Film by Ken Burns, PBS Production, 1994.