The Primal Teen: What the New Discoveries About the Teenage Brain Tell Us About Our Kids - Book Review

Science News, July 19, 2003

BARBARA STRAUCH

Parents of teenagers often think that something strange has happened in their children's minds, something that makes them at best difficult to handle and at worst irrational. Strauch, a health-and-medical writer for the New York Times, introduces a wealth of new data, including brain scans of teenagers, that confirms parents' suspicions. She shows that major changes occur in the brain during the teenage years. Until recently, scientists believed that brain development ended by the time a young person entered the teen years. However, new data suggest that the prefrontal cortex undergoes a complete rewiring at its synapses that affects judgment and causes dramatic shifts in mood and uncharacteristic behavior. Strauch also presents evidence that risk taking has biological roots and that it might be a natural, biologically driven urge among teens. Through interviews with parents, physicians, neuroscientists, and teens, the author has compiled impressive insights about the nature of being a teen or the parent of one. Doubleday, 2003, 242 p., hardcover, $24.95.