“The teen brain is a work in progress, making it more vulnerable than the mature brain to the physical effects of drugs. The potential for developing substance abuse and dependence is substantially greater when an individual’s first exposure to alcohol, nicotine and illicit drugs occurs during adolescence than in adulthood.”
–Laurence Steinberg, PhD, Distinguished University Professor, Laura H. Carnell Professor of Psychology, Temple University, Author, You and Your Adolescent: The Essential Guide for Ages 10 to 25
CASA: [National Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse] During adolescence, when the reward pathways in the brain are continuing to develop, they are readily influenced by external experiences and stimuli, including exposure to addictive substances.24 A growing body of evidence suggests that due to this increased sensitivity, addictive substances physically alter the reward centers of the brain faster and more intensely in adolescents than in adults, heightening their vulnerability to addiction.* 25
Addictive substances also adversely affect brain development and maturation in the areas related to motivation, judgment, inhibition and self control. 26
As a result, addictive substances impair the judgment of teens in the face of potential rewards, leading not only to their engagement in risky behaviors–such as driving while under the influence of alcohol or other drugs or participating in unsafe sexual practices- -but also to continued use of addictive substances despite negative consequences.27
For these reasons, adolescence is a “critical period”† with regard to teens’ encounters with addictive substances.28 Research suggests that the extensive structural and functional changes that the brain undergoes during adolescence allow addictive substances to exert a more powerful influence on the adolescent than the adult brain.29 The result of the increased sensitivity of the adolescent brain to the damaging and addictive properties of nicotine, alcohol and other drugs is twofold. First, addictive substances may have a greater andlonger-lasting effect on the adolescent brain, producing deficits in attention, learning, memory, decision making and other functions related to academic performance.30
Second, adolescents who use these substances may be more susceptible to developing addiction and a lifetime of substance-related problems.31
EDITOR: We supplied the above to our fourteen year old daughter.
We do not believe that all drugs in themselves are bad for adults. But alcoholic beverages and cigarettes are very dangerous for young people, both due to their potential impact upon the growth and function of their brains but also because undeveloped brains are especially susceptible to addiction.
Marijuana should continue to be illegal for young people, even though we advocate its availability to adults through the same sort of taxation, regulation and control that states have for alcohol and tobacco.
