We all think that adolescence ends around the age of 18: it is the transition to adulthood, and therefore supposedly to adulthood. However, a new scientific study has shaken up all our beliefs. Ultimately, we stay teenagers much longer than we think.
18 years old is the milestone that all teenagers (and their parents) impatiently await. For young people, it represents the transition to adulthood, with the new horizons that accompany it: driving, voting, drinking alcohol, going to nightclubs or casinos, and, more broadly, being able to be free to do what you want without parental authorization. For parents, it is above all the relief to finally see the famous adolescent crisis end! And yet… Although we actually become mature in the eyes of the law from the age of 18, our brain takes a little longer to relax.
Yes, a new study carried out by neuroscientists at the University of Cambridge has just proven that the brain goes through five stages of development during life, all at very specific ages. The researchers studied the neural connections of nearly 4,000 people, aged 0 to 90. We thus pass through “four crucial tipping points, during which our brain reconfigures itself” : one of these turns is none other than the transition from adolescence to adulthood, which occurs much later than we imagine.
Because, contrary to popular belief, we are not yet adults in our twenties. This change generally occurs at the age of… 32! “While puberty marks a clear beginning, the end of adolescence is much more difficult to define scientifically. Based solely on neural architecture, we found that the changes in brain structure characteristic of adolescence end around the early 30s.”explains Dr Alexa Mousley, lead author of the study. Concretely, during adolescence, it is the time when the efficiency of the brain is at its maximum: neuronal connections are rapid, and constantly increase, until they stabilize at the beginning of the thirties. This is why neuroscientists have established that this age constitutes the end of the adolescent period. “At age 32, the longest period of development begins, that of adulthood. The cerebral architecture stabilizes compared to previous phases, without major disruption for thirty years”specifies the researcher.
Indeed, among the five stages of human life, researchers therefore note: childhood from 0 to 9 years, adolescence from 9 to 32 years, adulthood from 32 to 66 years, early aging from 66 to 83 years, and finally late aging from 83 years. While we also imagined that adolescence began around the age of 12-13, the study, published in the scientific journal Nature Communicationsshows that this stage begins at the age of 9. This is the first big turning point in life, where “the brain experiences a major change in its cognitive abilities, as well as an increased risk of mental disorders”.
This redefinition of the major milestones of life calls into question many educational, social and medical benchmarks. It invites us to rethink the way in which we support young people, particularly between the ages of 20 and 30, a period still too often perceived as a phase of full autonomy while it remains, biologically, an area of intense construction. But let’s reassure parents right away, that doesn’t mean that your children’s teenage crisis will last until age 32!
