Moodiness, defiance, a fixation on friends and the online world, and an increased desire to compete and take risks – the teenage years can be hard to navigate for teens and mentally exhausting for parents. But NEUROSCIENCE EDUCATOR KATHRYN BERKETT says if we’re going to stop butting heads and help them through this, the change needs to start with us.
Feeling overwhelmed?
‘Kathryn – my teenager needs help. Can you recommend someone – please!
This is a phrase I hear often as a neuroscience trainer, running community sessions alongside my regular job of training organisations about how trauma impacts the developing brain.
It’s often at these community parenting sessions where this conversation starts. Parents or other supportive adults want to know how to stop the moodiness, the defiance. They ask me how to prevent their teenagers from fixating so much on their peers, worrying about what they look like and who they’re hanging out with.
Having raised two children myself, I understand how difficult this time is. It is a genuinely difficult period. So if you’re feeling overwhelmed, you are definitely not alone.
How to help
Despite how difficult this situation feels, I actually have a simple answer for anyone who asks for my help. That is: we need to change first, not them! If the adults change, we can often create a more supportive environment, which helps young people navigate these changes a bit less chaotically.
We need to remember that their brains are upgrading, their chemicals are altering, and their bodies are changing. There is just so much going on neurologically and biologically; it is really hard for them. As adults, we need to support them and understand as much as possible about what’s happening so we can create a space for them to feel as safe as possible as they go through this.
Kid brain 2.0
The first few years after puberty are when the brain goes through its second most active stage of change – the first being after birth. During these early adolescent years, sensitivity to dopamine (our buzz chemical in the brain) increases, glitches can occur with facial recognition and the ability to take perspective. These changes can make it really difficult for our young person to engage with others without feeling emotionally overwhelmed and potentially targeted.
Risk-taking activates dopamine, which can intensify risk-taking behaviour. Funnily enough, this is actually aimed at increasing the ability to make fast, accurate decisions as adults under pressure, when we need to protect those who depend on us. But even understanding the ‘why’ doesn’t take away the fact that their behaviour will definitely scare some of us parents along the way.
The post-puberty brain
After puberty, we can also see an increase in ‘clique’ formation as estrogen and oxytocin increases in the brain. Many of our teens have to be together with their friend group, or they ‘can’t handle it!’. There can be high emotions around being accepted into a group, then maybe kicked out again. This is natural. This increased need to be part of the group, which is aimed at improving our connection with each other, is biologically intended to create tight-knit groups that could help us co-parent. Many of you will remember this intense need to be part of a group when you were going through this stage.
However, social media is the new curveball thrown into the mix these days. This makes being part of a group – and also being rejected – a more frequent and obvious occurrence, making it all the more difficult.
The impact of testosterone
Testosterone can influence our desire to compete with others and is another factor in the changing teenage brain. Not everyone will show this change, but it is pretty evident in those who do. An intense need to prove how fast, strong or clever you can be can occur. Again, this increased competition for status is biologically activated to help improve our ability to protect and provide.
The problem is that modern access to online gaming, violence, and gambling takes advantage of these natural, biological brain changes. And that’s why our teenagers get so addicted to the online environment, particularly in the early adolescent years. Our biology hasn’t changed, but our environment has.
The key for parents
As the parent, the adult, or the support person, we need to know as much as possible about our teens and the changes going on in their brains in order to support them through this difficult transitional stage. If we can learn to respond in ways that complement rather than conflict with these brain changes, we can make this journey a whole lot easier on all of us.
I’m not promising complete rainbows and sunshine, but I can help you understand “What is Going on in There?” to make things a bit easier along the way.
*Kathryn Berkett is an internationally respected educator, keynote speaker, and neuroscience expert. She holds a Master’s in Educational Psychology, is a certified Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics (NMT) practitioner, and is currently completing a second Master’s in Applied Neuroscience at King’s College London.
Read more: << Helping your teen through tough times >>
