Teenagers: Why Do They Rebel?
Driving
fast, breaking curfew, arguing, shoplifting. Teenagers can push your patience,
but unfortunately, some kids go as far as blatantly flouting rules or breaking
the law, often with tragic results. What's with this rebellious streak? How can
parents funnel it into less risky business?
Recommended Related to Children
All teens go through similar phases -- the need for independence, a separate identity, testing authority. It's part of growing up; it's also linked to developmental changes in the brain that will eventually help them become analytical adults.
But
today's teens get an extra whammy -- social pressures come earlier than in
previous generations.
To
understand this complex picture, WebMD turned to two of the nation's experts.
David Elkind, PhD, is the author of All Grown Up and No Place to Go,
and is a professor of child development at Tufts University School of Medicine
in Boston. Amy Bobrow, PhD, is a clinical psychologist and professor in
the Child Study Center at New York University School of Medicine in Manhattan.
Brain: Under Construction
During
the teenage years, the area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex is
developing. This is the part of your brain that is behind your forehead. It's
your thinking cap and judgment center, Elkind explains, which means kids can
now develop their own ideals and ideas.
Whereas
younger children don't see the flaws in their parents, adolescents suddenly see
the world more realistically. "They construct an ideal of what parents should
be, based on their friends' parents, on media parents. When they compare their
own parents to the ideal, they find them wanting. Their parents don't know how
dress, walk, talk; they're embarrassing," he tells WebMD.
All the
arguments -- they're also the result of the prefrontal cortex at work, Elkind
says. As a child evolves into a teenager, the brain becomes able to synthesize
information into ideas. Teens want to exercise their new skill -- and they tend
to practice on their parents. "It may seem that they argue for the sake of
arguing. But really, they're practicing their new abilities."
Going Social
Whereas
wild clothes and make-up used to be a rite of passage into adolescence, that's
not true today, says Elkind. The preadolescent 11- and 12-year-olds -- the
Britney Spears generation -- are pushing that fashion envelope.
Body
piercing, tattoos, and music are today's "markers" of adolescence.
"No self-respecting 15-year-old is going to listen to Britney
Spears," he says.
Another
dynamic: first love, first sex, first drugs, first drinking. In earlier
generations, kids weren't expected to be sexually active -- or experiment with
alcohol or drugs -- until they turned 17 or 18, when they were better able to
resist peer pressure, says Elkind. "Now they're getting pressure at 13 and
14, when they're too young to resist. It's not that child development has
changed, it's that the demands are coming at earlier ages."
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