Understanding the Adolescent Brain

1. Understanding the Adolescent Brain Presented by Garfield Gini-Newman Associate Professor OISE/University of Toronto ggininewman@oise.utoronto.ca 1

2. "The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they alone knew everything and what passes for wisdom with us is foolishness with them. As for girls, they are forward, immodest and unwomanly in speech, behaviour and dress." Socrates c. 400 B.C.E. 3

3. Wikipedia generation is lazy and unprepared for university’s rigours, survey of faculty says Toronto Star, April 6, 2009 The evidence is strong that they [Net Geners] are the smartest generation ever. [They have] been given the opportunity to fulfill their inherent human intellectual potential as no other generation. Don Tapscott, Grown Up Digital, 2009

4. Some recommended reading

5. Does a child's belief about intelligence have anything to do with academic success? 100 seventh graders, all doing poorly in math, randomly assigned to workshops One workshop gave lessons on how to study well. The other taught about the nature of intelligence and thebrain.

6. Students in the latter group "learned that the brain actually forms new connections every time you learn something new, and that over time, this makes you smarter.” By the end of the semester, the group who had been taught that the brain can grow smarter, had significantly better math grades than the other group.

7. Nurturing a Growth Mindset Growth Mindset • see setbacks as a challenge that motivate • success is about stretching oneself • intelligence comes from hard work • School is an opportunity to expand intelligence Fixed Mindset • See intelligence as fixed - something you are born with • Success/failure is what is expected • School is about demonstrating your worth • Avoid challenges which may not immediately yield success

8. Think of an Adolescent You Know Reflecting on an adolescent you know, how many characteristics of the typical teenage can you list?

9. Marching to a Different Circadian Rhythm! • Teens begin to secrete melatonin, chemical neurotransmitter which makes us feel drowsy, 1 to 3 hours later and it lingers on later in the morning • Teens sleep needs far exceed adults – they need at least 9 hours • Teens are the most sleep-deprived segment of North American society

10. Implications of Sleep Deprivation for the Adolescent Learning • Do less well in school • Experience a greater feeling of sadness and hopelessness • Greater mood swings (less able to control emotions) • Less able to process emotions and are therefore prone to raw emotional outbursts • Causes an elevated level of the stress hormone, cortisol • Impairs ability to process glucose which contributes to obesity and type-2 diabetes – both on the rise among North American teens

11. Your Brain – “The Great Inhibitor” Brain development is essentially “progressive inhibition”

12. As children grow their inhibition machinery becomes more finely tuned Because the teens’ prefrontal cortex is not fully developed they are prone to more impulsive behaviour

13. Social Relationships and the Cerebellum Until recently, the cerebellum was assumed to control movement but have little other significance It now appears to be much more important in a wide range of behaviours including recognizing social cues

14. Social Relationships and the Cerebellum The cerebellum appears to: • Be the least heritable part of the brain (and therefore most shaped by the environment) • Change throughout adolescence • Be the last area of the brain to finish pruning and remodeling – even later than the frontal lobes

15. Social Relationships and the Cerebellum What are the implications and/or insights suggested by this new understanding of the cerebellum?

16. Emotions in Early Adolescence As the brain matures, it becomes more capable of impulse control and is better able at focused and sustained attention.

17. “Everyone gets angry; everyone has felt a desire for vengeance. The capacity to control impulses that arise from these feelings is the function of the prefrontal cortex…it takes many years for the necessary biological processes to hone a prefrontal cortex into an effective efficient executive. The fifteen-year-old brain does not have the biological machinery to inhibit impulses in the service of long-range planning. Daniel Weinberger, director of the Clinical Brain Disorders Laboratory at the National Institutes of Health

18. Seeking Thrills • During adolescence increasing levels of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex appear to be offset by decreases in the nucleus accumbens and other reward circuits. • Implications – teens with dopamine depleted reward systems need a greater stimulation to get the same sense of satisfaction as a young child or an adult

19. Neurons that fire together, wire together! Learning is a matter of making connections. 19

20. The Process of Long Term Potentiation When information (stimuli) is received, a trail along a series of neurons is blazed making it easier for subsequent messages to fire along the same path. The more the path is re-fired the more permanent the message or new learning becomes. Each time an activity is repeated the bonds between neurons strengthen and expand, leading to an entire network developing which remembers the skill or information. 20

21. Considering how the brain learns... ...how and why is the behaviour of an adolescent similar to that of a 2 year old?

22. At both stages, the brain is responding to... ...a massive build up of connections and pruning away excess connections allowing for a more refined and efficient brain.

23. Brain Sculpting Imagine you have set out to capture the essence of who you are in a marble sculpture. Reflect back to what life was like at age 11 or 12. Walk yourself through the defining experiences of your adolescence. While doing so, imagine yourself chipping away the excess marble to allow for the emergence of your adult self.

24. Shaping the mature brain The brain sculpts itself through its experience with the world. Teenagers need to realize that the brain is the only organ in the body that is sculpted through experience. What they are doing with their brain now is going to determine what their brainis going to become as an adult. 24

25. Pruning of the Adolescent Brain 25

26. Remember that... “...if teens are doing music and sports and academics, that’s how brains will be hardwired. If they are doing video games and MTV and lying on the couch, that will be how they are hardwired.” Jay Giedd 26

27. Myelination 27

28. The Myelination Process Understanding Myelination: • Myelin is a fatty, waxy substance that wraps itself around the axon • Myelin insulates the axon so that the electrical impulse travels more efficiently • The neurons you need to survive will myelinate first • Before a neuron is myelinated it is called immature • Myelination results in the creation of a more efficient brain 28

29. The Four Stages of Myelination Development Stages Birth to 2 years 2 to 7 Years 7 to 12 years Adolescence Myelin Release Parts of the Cerebellum, Parietal and Occipital Lobes (Primary Motor control area, Visual Processing Area, and Primary Sensory Area) Lobes dealing with speaking and language comprehension Temporal Lobe, Parietal Lobe and Cerebellum (memory, integrating sensory data and movement) Frontal Lobe (decision making, goal setting, reasoning)

30. Important Observations for Understanding Adolescence The frontal lobes are the last to be myelinated occurring as late as the early 20’s. What adolescent behaviour is explained by this observation? What are the parenting implications of this observation? 30

31. Teens need to solve problems and practice decision making. • Have teens apply learning to solve “real challenges” • Teach teens to use decision making models • Invite teens to consider implications and cause and consequence • Involve teens in making reasoned choices

32. How does the brain learn best? • Through experiential learning requiring children to move from the concrete to the abstract • Through problem solving and decision making • Through allowing children to “fail forward” • Scaffolding - do not ask an adolescent to multi-task until the learning has been internalized • Physical and other activities that improve coordination These types of activities activate the area of the brain responsible for critical thinking and problem solving. The more we do with adolescents which requires they solve problems, the more we assist in strengthening the area of the brain responsible for decision making.

33. Teen’s Window of Opportunity: The pre-frontal cortex

34. Window of Sensitivity • The flip side of the window of opportunity is the window of sensitivity • While the “window” of development is open, harmful effects can have potentially greater impact • A young child how has several serious ear infections may impair their ability to distinguish sounds later in life, but those same ear infections in an adult will not have the same effect

35. Teens and the Window of Sensitivity • Window of sensitivity to alcohol is wide open for teens • potential damaging effects of alcohol far greater for teens than for adults

36. Four Basic Emotions Researchers generally agree there are four basic emotions and that all other emotions are created from combinations of these four. • Fear • Anger • Sadness • Joy

37. Emotions, the Amygdala and the Teenage Brain • Any information received by the brain travels first to the amygdala • The amygdala holds emotional memory - it tells you how you feel about things • In the teenage brain, the amygdala is developing faster than the frontal lobes • So, teenagers tend to be reactive not reflective 37

38. Reading Facial Expressions 38

39. “Emotion drives attention and attention drives learning” In her book Brain Matters, Pat Wolfe noted: “The brain is biologically programmed to attend first to information that has a strong emotional content. It is also programmed to remember this information longer.”

40. What happens when the brain gets hijacked by negative emotions? The body is readied for the fight or flight response. The body is primed with adrenaline preparing it for the fastest physical reaction. The hypothalamus activates the amygdala, which in turn produces anger, rage, or threatening behaviour. 40

41. Ten Strategies for Guiding the Adolescent Brain • Take care of the brain with proper sleep, hydration, nutrition – and avoid caffeine after noon and beware the dangers of substance abuse. • Encourage extra curricular activities which develop social skills, physical fitness, problem solving, and encourage reading. • Be clear, explicit and avoid asking teens to multi-task.

42. Assist children in learning to chunk information. • Encourage problem solving, making connections, and involve children in identifying the problems in their actions and assist them in seeing the consequences. • Natural and logical consequences are preferable to punitive measures

43. Whenever possible, encourage children to build on their interests and talents – remember that intelligence is the ability to solve problems or create a product of value. • Recognize that emotions dominate and that teens are more likely to react than to reflect – assist them in making wise choices and avoid anger as a response.

44. Assist children in their learning by helping them move from the concrete to the abstract and remember that “being there” is the most powerful way to learn. • Above all, be patient – remember teenage brain is a work in progress!