Teens Just Wanna Have Fun: Why Teenagers Are Prone To Poor Judgment

Keeping kids safe at any age is a lot of work. I remember a skateboarding scare my son gave me when he was 11 years old. He called me demanding I drive over and pick him up from the church down the street: a five minute walk. I laughed and he said, “I’m serious mom.” I countered with, “explain to me why I have to get the car and drive to the corner to pick you up.” He says, I really hurt myself skateboarding.” Well, that did it, you couldn’t see me for dust and my heart was beating fast and furious in my throat not knowing what I‘d find.

There he was sitting with his legs straight out and obviously in pain.The horrors that flashed through my mind intensified my fear. I checked to see if anything was broken and nothing was: thank goodness. His injuries consisted of a severe case of hurt pride, some badly strained muscles and a pulled ligament but it could have been worse.

Once I was sure he would survive his ordeal, I got on my mommy soapbox and started my sermon on the dangers of skateboarding along a railing or down steps. I went over the cost of medical bills, the possibility of becoming a paraplegic, the pain that his injuries would inflict on his parents and all the things in his future he could have missed because of his stupidity. There he sat staring at this red faced wild woman flailing her arms in the air. Judging by the expression on his face I’m pretty sure that what he heard was,” blah, blah, blah, skateboarding, blah blah skateboarding, blah, blah blah.

What makes teens so prone to making poor judgments and risky decisions? There’s been a recent study done of over 900 individuals. It found that compared to adults, teenagers think less about the future and prefer instant gratification. This part I already knew and is part of my lecture series to my son on a weekly basis. However, the reason for these findings is interesting: teen brains are immature in the thrill seeking system rather than the part that’s responsible for self-control. This is probably why my son says his dad and I are boring. He thinks our thrill seeking days are long behind us. Actually, it’s more of our death defying thrill seeking days that are over. The thrill of seeing him go safely off to college can not be calculated. You can read more about the study at Science News.


Photo by Jordan Woods