Problem:
In the adolescent period, the brain reaches a crossroads when transitioning from a childhood brain and beginning to move toward an adult brain. With that comes an increased capacity to learn and retain new information, with lower influence from the prefrontal cortex. As mentioned in previous weeks, the prefrontal cortex is the area of the brain that controls our insight and decision making, which also includes risk taking. As we reach the adolescent stage, the areas in our brain begin to connect and work toward an adult brain as mentioned. With that said, the last piece to connect is that prefrontal cortex. Adolescents develop a greater brain capacity and capacity to retain information, but lack the judgment and insight that may come with that.
Looking at Piaget's stages of development, adolescents fit into the formal operational stage, which is 11+ years of age. In this stage, individuals gain the ability to create abstract thoughts and begin to develop metacognition. Included in this is hypothetical-deductive reasoning. With that, however, still includes a lack of judgement in the early years. Because of this, adolescents tend to take more risks. They can create a hypothesis or experiment, but don't always have the insight to decide whether it is something to peruse or not.
Overall, the video explains a stark contrast between an adolescents intellectual and emotional growth. They continue their patterns and development of increased information retention and knowledge, but lack the insight or decision-making to always properly channel that new found information, often leading to higher risk-taking decisions. Need Assignment Help?
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