Galvan’s experiment was quite ingenuous. She had kids, teens, and adults play a pirate video game while inside an fMRI scanner, with their heads restrained. Their arms were free to push buttons. With each successful turn of the game, they won some gold–on the screen flashed either a single gold coin, a small stack of coins, or a jackpot pile of gold.

Young kids find any sort of reward thrilling, so their brains lit up the same amount, no matter how much gold they won. Adult brains lit up according to the size of the reward: single coin, small pleasure response, big pile, big pleasure response. The teen brains did not light up in response to winning the small or medium reward–in fact, the nucleus accumbens activity dipped below baseline, as if they were crestfallen. Only to the big pile of gold did their reward center light up–and then it really lit up, signaling more activity than kids or adults ever showed.

Galvan noted that the response pattern of teen brains is essentially the same response curve of a seasoned drug addict. Their reward center cannot be stimulated by low doses–they need the big jolt to get pleasure.

The above passage is from the book Nurture Shock by Po Bronson & Ashley Merryman. I find the study they cite very interesting, particularly because I was a teenage drug addict, which I accredit (at least partially) to the overwhelming feeling of absolute boredom which seems to be an inherent trait of adolescence. Compound that with the raging, depressing anxiety of not knowing where your next high will come from, and BAM! You’ve got one hell of a hybrid, monster emo-teen. (God bless my poor parents)

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Work above by Smithe

Tags:drug addictionneurologyparentingpsychology