The Impact of Stress on Adolescent’s Brain Development
A lot of the existing neural development literature focuses on prenatal and early neonatal development stages. However, neuroscientists have started to establish important remodeling of the brain in terms of brain structure and functioning, particularly within the cortical and limbic areas, which happens during pubertal growth. For example, studies on both humans and non-human animals reveal significant volumetric gains in the amygdala and hippocampus areas during the early puberty stages (Weems, 2017). In conjunction with structural neuroimaging, longitudinal experiments have discovered dynamic white matter and cortical grey matter volume variations throughout teenage. This post emphasizes the effects of stress on brain development during adolescence. The studies by Eiland & Romeo (2013) revealed that chronic stress considerably alters adolescent’s corticolimbic morphology. Besides, the adolescent’s social environment significantly impacts the frontal cortex structure of the teenage brain.
Stressors may greatly change the play and social interaction behaviors during the teenage developmental stage. Other studies show that stress influence youths to make unwarranted decisions or options in life. The research shows that youths are highly affected by stress because of the stress effects on the prefrontal cortex of the brains (Weems, 2017). Changes in the development of the prefrontal cortex, the brain section that helps in behavior control, and the understanding of consequences of an individual’s conduct. The prefrontal cortex region of the brain is usually immature during adolescents and this explains why youths may act with no clear understanding of the consequences (Eiland & Romeo, 2013). The adolescent stage is the stage at which individuals develop their identity. In light of this, the damage that stress has on the development of the prefrontal cortex influences the decisions the adolescents make. Stress affects both the prefrontal cortex and the reward system of the brain because these regions are still not fully developed. Stress will thus alter their development and make them start to malfunction.
References
Eiland, L., & Romeo, R. D. (2013). Stress and the developing adolescent brain. Neuroscience, 249, 162-171. DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroscience.2012.10.048
Weems, C. F. (2017). Severe stress and the development of the amygdala in youth: A theory and its statistical implications. Developmental Review, 46, 44-53.