NST II - Adolescence
Lent Term 2024

Yakovlev, P. A., & Lecours, I. R. (1967). The myelogenetic cycles of regional maturation of the brain. In A. Minkowski (Ed.), Regional Development of the brain in early life. Oxford: Blackwell.

Dual system model

Casey, B. J., Getz, S., & Galvan, A. (2008). The adolescent brain. Developmental Review, 28(1), 62–77. [REVIEW]

†Casey, BJ, Galván, A, Somerville, LH. (2016). Beyond simple models of adolescence to an integrated circuit-based account: A commentary. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 17: 128–130. [REVIEW]

†Mills, K.L., Goddings, A-L., Clasen, L.S., Giedd, J.N. & Blakemore, S-J. (2014). The developmental mismatch in structural brain maturation during adolescence. Developmental Neuroscience, 36, 147-160.

†Romer D, Reyna VF, Satterthwaite TD (2017). Beyond stereotypes of adolescent risk taking: Placing the adolescent brain in developmental context. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 27, 19-34. [REVIEW]

Shulman, E.P., Smith, A.R., Silva, K., Icenogle, G., Duell, N., Chein, J., Steinberg L. (2016). The dual systems model: Review, reappraisal, and reaffirmation. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 17, 103-17. [REVIEW]

Steinberg, L., Albert, D., Cauffman, E., Banich, M., Graham, S., & Woolard, J. (2008). Age differences in sensation seeking and impulsivity as indexed by behavior and self-report: evidence for a dual systems model. Developmental Psychology, 44(6), 1764–1778.

Puberty and structural brain development

†Goddings A.L., Mills, K.L., Clasen, L., Giedd, J. Viner, R.M. & Blakemore, S-J. (2014). The influence of puberty on subcortical brain development. NeuroImage, 88, 242-251

Herting, M.M., Gautam, P., Spielberg, J.M., Kan, E., Dahl, R.E. & Sowell, E.R. (2014). The Role of Testosterone and Estradiol in Brain Volume Changes Across Adolescence: A Longitudinal Structural MRI Study. Human Brain Mapping, 35(11), 5633-5645.

Herting, M.M. & Sowell, E.R. (2017). Puberty and structural brain development in humans. Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology, 44, 122-137. [REVIEW]

Menzies, L., Goddings, A-L., Whitaker, K.J., Blakemore, S-J. & Viner, R.M. (2015). The effects of puberty on white matter development in boys. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 11, 116-28

Peper, J.S., Hulshoff Pol, H.E., Crone, E.A. & van Honk, J. (2011). Sex steroids and brain structure in pubertal boys and girls. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 34, 332-342. [REVIEW]

Peper, J.S., Schnack, H.G., Brouwer, R.M., Van Baal, G.C.M., Pjetri, E., Székely, E., van Leeuwen, M., van den Berg, S.M., Collins, D.L., Evans, A.C., Boomsma, D.I., Kahn, R.S. & Hulshoff Pol, H.E. (2009). Heritability of regional and global brain structure at the onset of puberty: a magnetic resonance imaging study in 9-year-old twin pairs. Human Brain Mapping 30(7), 2184-96.

†Vijayakumar, N., Op de Macks, Z., Shirtcliff, E.A. & Pfeifer, J.H. (2018). Puberty and the human brain: Insights into adolescent development. Neuroscience and Biobehavioural Reviews, 92, 417-436. [REVIEW]

Lecture 2 - Adolescence from an Evolutionary Anthropological Perspective

Dr. Emily Emmott, UCL

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Titles

Is adolescence special?
Are there cross-cultural differences in adolescence?
Is adolescence universal?
What characteristics of adolescence are general across species and what are unique to humans?
What is the function of extended adolescence?

Background paper on human life history evolution

†Kaplan, H., Lancaster, J. & Robson, A. (2003). Embodied capital and the evolutionary economics of the human life span. Population and Development Review, 29, 152-182. [REVIEW]

Application of life history theory to understand adolescence

*Worthman, C. & Trang, K. (2018). Dynamics of body time, social time and life history at adolescence. Nature, 554, 451–457. [REVIEW]

†Ellis, B.J., Del Giudice, M., Dishion, T.J., Figueredo, A.J., Gray, P., Griskevicius, V., Hawley, P.H., Jacobs, W.J., James, J., Volk, A.A. & Wilson, D. S. (2012). The evolutionary basis of risky adolescent behavior: implications for science, policy, and practice. Developmental psychology, 48(3), 598. [REVIEW]

Cross-cultural comparison of adolescence (book)

Schlegel, A. & Barry Iii, H. (1991). Adolescence: An anthropological inquiry. Free Press.

Lecture 3 - Risk-Taking and Peer Influence in Adolescence

Sarah-Jayne Blakemore

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Titles

Are adolescents more influenced by their peers than other age groups?
What adolescent-specific or adolescent-emergent changes in self-control occur during this period?
Why do you think society has negative stereotypes of adolescents? Are these stereotypes supported by the evidence?
Describe and discuss the models of adolescent risk taking.
Is risk taking heightened in adolescence?

Risk taking

AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety (2018). 2017 Traffic Safety Culture Index (Technical Report). Washington, D.C.: AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.

Amir, D., Jordan, M.R., McAuliffe, K., Valeggia, C.R., Sugiyama, L.S., Bribiescas, R.G., Snodgrass, J.J. & Dunham, Y. (2019). The developmental origins of risk and time preferences across diverse societies. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 149(4), 650-661.

Burnett, S., Bault, N., Coricelli, G. & Blakemore, S-J. (2010). Adolescents' heightened risk-seeking in a probabilistic gambling task. Cognitive Development, 25(2), 183-196.

†Casey, B.J. (2015). Beyond simple models of self-control to circuit-based accounts of adolescent behaviour. Annual Review of Psychology, 66, 295-319. [REVIEW]

Defoe, I.N., Dubas, J.S., Figner, B. & van Aken, M.A. (2015). A meta-analysis on age differences in risky decision making: adolescents versus children and adults. Psychological Bulletin, 141(1), 48-84.

Do, K.T., Sharp, P.B. & Telzer, E.H. (2020). Modernizing Conceptions of Valuation and Cognitive-Control Deployment in Adolescent Risk Taking. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 29(1), 102-109.

Duell, N., Steinberg, L., Chein, J., Al-Hassan, S.M., Bacchini, D., Lei, C., Chaudhary, N., Di Giunta, L., Dodge, K.A., Fanti, K.A., Lansford, J.E., Malone, P.S., Oburu, P., Pastorelli, C., Skinner, A.T., Sorbring, E., Tapanya, S., Uribe Tirado, L.M., & Alampay, L.P. (2016). Interaction of reward seeking and self-regulation in the prediction of risk taking: A cross-national test of the dual systems model. Developmental Psychology, 52(10), 1593–1605.

Ernst, M., Pine, D. S. & Hardin, M. (2006). Triadic model of the neurobiology of motivated behavior in adolescence. Psychological Medicine, 36(3), 299-312.

Figner, B. & Weber, E.U. (2011). Who takes risks when and why? Determinants of risk taking. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 20(4), 211-216. [REVIEW]

Figner, B., Mackinlay, R.J., Wilkening, F. & Weber, E.U. (2009). Affective and deliberative processes in risky choice: age differences in risk taking in the Columbia Card Task. Journal of Experimental Psychology, Learning, Memory and Cognition, 35(3), 709-30.

Gardner, M. & Steinberg, L. (2005). Peer Influence on Risk Taking, Risk Preference, and Risky Decision Making in Adolescence and Adulthood: An Experimental Study. Developmental Psychology, 41(4), 625–635.

Humphrey, G. & Dumontheil, I. (2016). Development of Risk-Taking, Perspective-Taking, and Inhibitory Control During Adolescence. Developmental Neuropsychology, 41(1-2), 59-76.

†Mills, K.L., Goddings, A.L., Clasen, L.S., Giedd, J.N. & Blakemore, S-J. (2014). The developmental mismatch in structural brain maturation during adolescence. Developmental Neuroscience, 36(3-4), 147-60.

†Romer, D., Reyna, V.F. & Satterthwaite, T.D. (2017). Beyond stereotypes of adolescent risk-taking: Placing the adolescent brain in developmental context. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 27, 19-34. [REVIEW]

Shulman, E.P., Smith, A.R., Silva, K., Icenogle, G., Duell, N., Chein, J., & Steinberg, L. (2016). The dual systems model: Review, reappraisal, and reaffirmation. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 17, 103-117. [REVIEW]

†Steinberg, L. (2010). A dual systems model of adolescent risk-taking. Developmental Psychobiology: The Journal of the International Society for Developmental Psychobiology, 52(3), 216-224.

†Steinberg, L., Albert, D., Cauffman, E., Banich, M., Graham, S. & Woolard, J. (2008). Age differences in sensation seeking and impulsivity as indexed by behavior and self-report: evidence for a dual systems model. Developmental Psychology, 44(6), 1764-78.

Steinberg, L., Icenogle, G., Shulman, E. P., Breiner, K., Chein, J., Bacchini, D.,… Takash, H. M. S. (2017). Around the world, adolescence is a time of heightened sensation seeking and immature self-regulation. Developmental Science, 21(2), 1-13.

Tymula, A., Rosenberg Belmaker, L.A., Roy, A.K., Ruderman, L., Manson, K., Glimcher, P.W. & Levy, I. (2012). Adolescents' risk-taking behavior is driven by tolerance to ambiguity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 109(42), 17135-40.

Van Den Bos, W., & Hertwig, R. (2017). Adolescents display distinctive tolerance to ambiguity and to uncertainty during risky decision making. Scientific reports, 7(1), 1-11.

†Van Duijvenvoorde, A.C.K., Peters, S., Braams, B.R. & Crone, E.A. (2016). What motivates adolescents? Neural responses to rewards and their influence on adolescents’ risk taking, learning and cognitive control. Neuroscience & Biobehavioural Reviews, 70, 135-147. [REVIEW]

Viner, R. M., Coffey, C., Mathers, C., Bloem, P., Costello, A., Santelli, J. & Patton, G. C. (2011). 50-year mortality trends in children and young people: A study of 50 low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries. The Lancet, 377(9772), 1164-74.

Wolf, L.K., Wright, N.D., Kilford, E.J., Dolan, R.J. & Blakemore, S-J. (2013). Developmental changes in effects of risk and valence on adolescent decision-making. Cognitive Development, 28(3), 290-299.

Peer influence on decision making and social risk taking

Ahmed, S., Foulkes, L., Leung, J.T., Griffin, C., Sakhardande, A., Bennett, M., Dunning, D.L., Griffiths, K., Parker, J., Kuyken, W., Williams, J.M.G., Dalgleish, T. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). Susceptibility to prosocial and antisocial influence in adolescence. Journal of Adolescence, 84, 56-68.

†Andrews, J. L., Foulkes, L. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). Peer influence in adolescence: Public-health implications for COVID-19. Trends in Cognitive Science, 24(8), 585-87.

†Andrews, J.L., Foulkes, L., Bone, J. K. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). Amplified concern for social risk in adolescence: Development and validation of a new measure. Brain Sciences, 10(6), 397.

Andrews, J.L., Foulkes, L., Griffin, C. & Blakemore, S-J. (2019). The effect of social preference on academic diligence in adolescence. Royal Society Open Science, 6(9), 190165

*Blakemore, S-J. (2018). Avoiding social risk in adolescence. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 27(2), 116-122. [REVIEW]

Blakemore, S-J. & Mills, K. L. (2014). Is adolescence a sensitive period for sociocultural processing? Annual Review of Psychology, 65, 187-207.

Bonell, C., Blakemore, S-J., Fletcher, A. & Patton, G. (2019). Role theory of schools and adolescent health. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 3(10), 742-48.

Burke, A. R., McCormick, C. M., Pellis, S. M. & Lukkes, J. L. (2017). Impact of adolescent social experiences on behavior and neural circuits implicated in mental illness. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 76(B), 280-300.

†Chein, J., Albert, D., O’Brien, L., Uckert, K. & Steinberg, L (2011). Peers increase adolescent risk taking by enhancing activity in the brain’s reward circuitry. Developmental Science, 14, F1–F10.

Chierchia, G., Piera Pi-Sunyer, B. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). Prosocial influence and opportunistic conformity in adolescents and young adults. Psychological Science, 31(12), 1585-1601.

*Crone, E.A., & Dahl, R.E. (2012). Understanding adolescence as a period of social–affective engagement and goal flexibility. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 13(9), 636-650. [REVIEW]

Einon, D. F. & Morgan, M. J. (1977). A critical period for social isolation in the rat. Developmental Psychobiology, 10(2), 123-32.

Foulkes, L., Leung, J., Fuhrmann, D., Knoll, L. & Blakemore, S-J. (2018). Age differences in the prosocial influence effect. Developmental Science, 21(6), e12666.

Fuhrmann, D., Casey, C.S., Speekenbrink, M. & Blakemore, S-J. (2019). Social Exclusion Affects Working Memory Performance in Young Adolescent Girls. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 40, 100718.

Gardner, M. & Steinberg, L. (2005). Peer influence on risk taking, risk preference, and risky decision making in adolescence and adulthood: an experimental study. Developmental Psychology, 41(4), 625-35.

Knoll, L., Gaule, A., Lazari, A., Jacobs, E. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). Neural correlates of social influence on risk perception during development. Social Neuroscience, 15(3), 355-367.

Knoll, L.J., Leung, J.T., Foulkes, L. & Blakemore, S-J. (2017) Age-related differences in social influence on risk perception depend on the direction of influence. Journal of Adolescence, 60, 53-63.

†Knoll, L.J., Magis-Weinberg, L., Speekenbrink, M. & Blakemore, S-J. (2015). Social influence of risk perception during adolescence. Psychological Science, 25, 583-592.

Logue, S., Chein, J., Gould, T., Holliday, E. & Steinberg., L. (2013). Adolescent mice, unlike adults, consume more alcohol in the presence of peers than alone. Developmental Science, 17(1), 79-85.

Paluck, E. L., Shepherd, H. & Aronow, P. M. (2016). Changing climates of conflict: A social network experiment in 56 schools. PNAS, 113(3), 566-71.

Sebastian, C., Viding, E., Williams, K. D. & Blakemore, S-J. (2010). Social brain development and the affective consequences of ostracism in adolescence. Brain and Cognition, 72(1), 134-45.

Silva, K., Shulman, E.P., Chein, J. & Steinberg, L. (In Press). Peers Increase Late Adolescents’ Exploratory Behavior and Sensitivity to Positive and Negative Feedback. Journal of Research on Adolescence.

†Steinberg, L. (2008). A Social Neuroscience Perspective on Adolescent Risk-Taking. Developmental Review, 28(1), 78-106. [REVIEW]

Williams, K. D., Cheung, C. K. T. & Choi, W. (2000). Cyberostracism: Effects of being ignored over the internet. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79(5), 748-62.

Wolf, L.K., Bazargani, N., Kilford, E.J., Dumontheil, I. & Blakemore, S-J. (2015). The audience effect in adolescence depends on who's looking over your shoulder. Journal of Adolescence 43, 5-14.

Lecture 4 - Adolescent Mental Health

Dr. Sharon Neufeld, Psychiatry, Cambridge

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Titles

What are the mental health conditions that are common among adolescents and what are the risk factors for the onset and persistence of these conditions during adolescence?
Why is adolescence a peak time for the onset of several mental health conditions?
What is the impact of COVID-19 on the mental health of adolescents?
Have outcomes for the mental health of adolescents changed over time?
What is the relationship between mental health and educational attainment in adolescence?

Prevalence

*Collishaw, S. (2015). Annual research review: secular trends in child and adolescent mental health. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 56(3), 370-393. [REVIEW]

Ford, T. (2020). Editorial Perspective: Why I am now convinced that emotional disorders are increasingly common among young people in many countries. The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.

Polanczyk, G.V., Salum, G.A., Sugaya, L.S., Caye, A. & Rohde, L.A. (2015). Annual research review: A meta‐analysis of the worldwide prevalence of mental disorders in children and adolescents. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 56(3), 345-65. [REVIEW]

*Sadler, K., Vizard, T., Ford, T., Marchesell, F., Pearce, N., Mandalia, D., Davis, J., Brodie, E., Forbes, N. Goodman, A. & Goodman, R. (2018). Mental Health of Children and Young People in England, 2017.

Solmi, M., Radua, J., Olivola, M. et al. Age at onset of mental disorders worldwide: large-scale meta-analysis of 192 epidemiological studies. Mol Psychiatry 27, 281–295 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-021-01161-7 [REVIEW]

Global Burden of Disease

Castelpietra G, Knudsen AK, Agardh E, et al. The burden of mental disorders, substance use disorders and self-harm among young people in Europe, 1990−2019: findings from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019. Lancet Reg Health Eur. 2022. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanepe.2022.100341

Neufeld, SAS. (2022). The burden of young people’s mental health conditions in Europe: no cause for complacency. The Lancet Regional Health – Europe, 16: 100364. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanepe.2022.100364

*COVID-19 Mental Disorders Collaborators. Global prevalence and burden of depressive and anxiety disorders in 204 countries and territories in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Lancet. 2021;398(10312):1700–1712. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02143-7

Function

*Costello, E.J. & Maughan, B. (2015). Annual research review: optimal outcomes of child and adolescent mental illness. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 56(3), 324-41. [REVIEW]

Sellers, R., Warne, N., Pickles, A., Maughan, B., Thapar, A. & Collishaw, S. (2019). Cross‐cohort change in adolescent outcomes for children with mental health problems. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 60(7), 813-21.

Lecture 5 - Learning in Adolescence

Sarah-Jayne Blakemore and Emily Towner

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Title

Discuss the evidence that adolescent learning is different from adult learning.

*Towner, E. A., Chierchia, G. & Blakemore, S-J. (2023). Sensitivity and specificity in affective and social learning in adolescence. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 27(7), 642-655.

Chierchia, G., Soukupová, M., Kilford, E.J., Griffin, C., Leung, J., Palminteri, S. & Blakemore, S-J. (2022). Confirmatory reinforcement learning changes with age during adolescence. Developmental Science, 26(3), e13330.

Palminteri, S., Levebvre, G., Kilford, E.J. & Blakemore, S-J. (2017). Confirmation bias in human reinforcement learning: evidence from counterfactual feedback processing. PLOS Computational Biology, 13(8), e1005684.

†Palminteri, S, Kilford, E. J., Coricelli, G. & Blakemore, S-J. (2016). The computational development of reinforcement learning during adolescence. PLOS Computational Biology, 12(6), e1004953.

†Knoll, L.J.*, Fuhrmann, D.*, Sakhardande, A., Stamp, F., Speekenbrink, M. & Blakemore, S-J. (2016). A window of opportunity for cognitive training in adolescence. Psychological Science, 27(12),1620-1631. *Joint first authors

†Pattwell, S. S., Duhoux, S., Hartley, C. A., Johnson, D. C., Jing, D., Elliott, M. D., Ruberry, E. J., Powers, A., Mehta, N., Yang, R. R., Soliman, F., Glatt, C. E., Casey, B. J., Ninan, I., & Lee, F. S. (2012). Altered fear learning across development in both mouse and human. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 109(40), 16318–16323.

McCane, A. M., Wegener, M. A., Faraji, M., Rivera-Garcia, M. T., Wallin-Miller, K. G., Costa, V. D., & Moghaddam, B. (2021). Adolescent Dopamine Neurons Represent Reward Differently during Action and State Guided Learning. The Journal of Neuroscience: The Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 41(45), 9419–9430.

Galván, A., & McGlennen, K. M. (2013). Enhanced striatal sensitivity to aversive reinforcement in adolescents versus adults. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25(2), 284–296.

Davidow, J. Y., Foerde, K., Galván, A., & Shohamy, D. (2016). An Upside to Reward Sensitivity: The Hippocampus Supports Enhanced Reinforcement Learning in Adolescence. Neuron, 92(1), 93–99.

Cann, C., Venniro, M., Hope, B. T., & Ramsey, L. A. (2020). Parametric investigation of social place preference in adolescent mice. Behavioral Neuroscience, 134(5), 435–443.

Nardou, R., Lewis, E. M., Rothhaas, R., Xu, R., Yang, A., Boyden, E., & Dölen, G. (2019). Oxytocin-dependent reopening of a social reward learning critical period with MDMA. Nature, 569(7754), 116–120.

Odriozola, P., & Gee, D. G. (2021). Learning About Safety: Conditioned Inhibition as a Novel Approach to Fear Reduction Targeting the Developing Brain. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 178(2), 136–155.

Hornstein, E. A., & Eisenberger, N. I. (2022). Exploring the effect of loneliness on fear: Implications for the effect of COVID-19-induced social disconnection on anxiety. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 153, 104101.

Skversky-Blocq, Y., Pine, D. S., & Shechner, T. (2021). Using a novel paradigm to examine observational fear-learning across development. Depression and Anxiety.

Silvers, J. A., Callaghan, B. L., VanTieghem, M., Choy, T., O’Sullivan, K., & Tottenham, N. (2021). An exploration of amygdala-prefrontal mechanisms in the intergenerational transmission of learned fear. Developmental Science, 24(3), e13056.

Nussenbaum, K., & Hartley, C. A. (2019). Reinforcement learning across development: What insights can we draw from a decade of research? Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 40, 100733.

Hauser, T. U., Will, G.-J., Dubois, M., & Dolan, R. J. (2019). Annual Research Review: Developmental computational psychiatry. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, and Allied Disciplines, 60(4), 412–426.

Palminteri, S., & Pessiglione, M. (2017). Opponent Brain Systems for Reward and Punishment Learning. In Decision Neuroscience (pp. 291–303).

Larsen B, Luna B. (2018). Adolescence as a neurobiological critical period for the development of higher-order cognition. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 94:179-195.

Lecture 6 - Social Media and Adolescence

Dr. Amy Orben, MRC CBU, Cambridge

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Titles

Discuss the evidence that social media affects wellbeing in adolescence.

Reviews and Perspectives

Boyd, D. (2014). It’s complicated: The social lives of networked teens. Yale University Press.

George, M.J., & Odgers, C.L. (2015). Seven Fears and the Science of How Mobile Technologies May Be Influencing Adolescents in the Digital Age. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 10(6), 832–51.

Meier, Adrian, and Leonard Reinecke. ‘Computer-Mediated Communication, Social Media, and Mental Health: A Conceptual and Empirical Meta-Review’. Communication Research, 2021, 009365022095822.

†Nesi, Jacqueline, Sophia Choukas-Bradley, and Mitchell J. Prinstein. ‘Transformation of Adolescent Peer Relations in the Social Media Context: Part 1—A Theoretical Framework and Application to Dyadic Peer Relationships’. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review 21, no. 3 (September 2018): 267–94.

*Odgers, C.L. & Jensen, M.R. (2020). Annual Research Review: Adolescent mental health in the digital age: facts, fears, and future directions. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 61, 336-348.

Valkenburg, Patti M., Adrian Meier, and Ine Beyens. ‘Social Media Use and Its Impact on Adolescent Mental Health: An Umbrella Review of the Evidence’. Current Opinion in Psychology 44 (April 2022): 58–68.

†Weinstein, Emily, and Carrie James. Behind Their Screens: What Teens Are Facing (and Adults Are Missing), 2022.

Core Studies

*Beyens, Ine, J. Loes Pouwels, Irene I. van Driel, Loes Keijsers, and Patti M. Valkenburg. ‘Social Media Use and Adolescents’ Well-Being: Developing a Typology of Person-Specific Effect Patterns’. Communication Research, 13 December 2021, 009365022110381.

Jensen, M., George, M.J., Russell, M.R. & Odgers, C.L. (2019). Young Adolescents’ Digital Technology Use and Mental Health Symptoms: Little Evidence of Longitudinal or Daily Linkages. Clinical Psychological Science, 7(6), 1416-33.

Orben, A. & Przybylski, A.K. (2019). Screens, Teens, and Psychological Well-Being: Evidence from Three Time-Use-Diary Studies. Psychological Science, 30(5), 682-696.

Orben, A. & Przybylski, A.K. (2019). The association between adolescent well-being and digital technology use. Nature Human Behavior, 3, 173-182.

Orben, A., Dienlin, T. & Przybylski, A.K. (2019). Social Media’s Enduring Effect on Adolescent Life Satisfaction. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 116(21), 10226–28.

*Orben, Amy, Andrew K. Przybylski, Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, and Rogier A. Kievit. ‘Windows of Developmental Sensitivity to Social Media’. Nature Communications 13, no. 1 (December 2022): 1649.

†Przybylski, A.K. & Weinstein, N. (2017). A large-scale test of the Goldilocks hypothesis: Quantifying the relations between digital-screen use and the mental well-being of adolescents. Psychological Science, 28, 204–215

Twenge, J.M., Joiner, T.E., Rogers, M.L. & Martin, G.N. (2017). Increases in depressive symptoms, suicide-related outcomes, and suicide rates among U.S. adolescents after 2010 and links to increased new media screen time. Clinical Psychological Science, 6, 3–17.

Measurement Debate

Davidson, B.I., Shaw, H. & Ellis, D.A. (2020). When Psychometrics Fail: What Are Technology Usage Scales Actually Measuring? PsyArXiv.

Ellis, D.A., Davidson, B.I., Shaw, H. & Geyer, K. (2019). Do Smartphone Usage Scales Predict Behavior? International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 130, 86–92.

*Parry, D., Davidson, B.I., Sewall, C., Fisher, J.T., Mieczkowski, H. & Quintana, D.S. (2020). Measurement Discrepancies Between Logged and Self-Reported Digital Media Use: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. PsyArXiv.

Policy Debate

*Hawkes, N. (2019). CMO Report Is Unable to Shed Light on Impact of Screen Time and Social Media on Children’s Health. BMJ, 364, l643.

Davies, S.C., Atherton, F., Calderwood, C. & McBride, M. (2019, February 7th). United Kingdom Chief Medical Officers’ commentary on ‘Screen-based activities and children and young people’s mental health and psychosocial wellbeing: A systematic map of reviews.’ Department of Health and Social Care.

Viner, R., Davie, M. & Firth, A. (2019, January). The health impacts of screen time: A guide for clinicians and parents. Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.

Neuroscientific Approaches

*Crone, K.E. & Konijn E.A. (2018). Media use and brain development during adolescence. Nature Communications, 9, 588.

Maza, Maria T., Kara A. Fox, Seh-Joo Kwon, Jessica E. Flannery, Kristen A. Lindquist, Mitchell J. Prinstein, and Eva H. Telzer. ‘Association of Habitual Checking Behaviors on Social Media With Longitudinal Functional Brain Development’. JAMA Pediatrics, 3 January 2023.

*Orben, A., Tomova, L. & Blakemore, S-J. (2020). The Effects of Social Deprivation on Adolescent Development and Mental Health. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 4(8), 634–40. [REVIEW]

Pfeifer, J.H. & Allen, N.B. (In Press). Puberty Initiates Cascading Relationships between Neurodevelopmental, Social, and Internalizing Processes across Adolescence. Biological Psychiatry.

Historical Takes

Grimes, T., Anderson, J. A. & Bergen, L. (2008). Media violence and aggression: Science and ideology. Sage.

Gruenberg, S.M. (1935). Radio and the child. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 177(1), 123–128.

*Orben, A. The Sisyphean Cycle of Technology Panics. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 15(5), 1143–57.

Wartella, E. & Reeves, B. (1985). Historical trends in research on children and the media: 1900–1960. Journal of Communication, 35, 118–133.

Cyberbullying

Modecki, K.L., Minchin, J., Harbaugh, A.G., Guerra, N.G. & Runions, K.C. (2014). Bullying prevalence across contexts: a meta-analysis measuring cyber and traditional bullying. Journal of Adolescent Health, 55, 602–611.

*Przybylski, A.K. & Bowes, L. (2017). Cyberbullying and Adolescent Well-Being in England: A Population-Based Cross-Sectional Study. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 1(1), 19–26.

Lecture 7 - Adolescent Social Development – Brain and Behaviour

Sarah-Jayne Blakemore

*=essential

†=recommended

Suggested Essay Titles

How might adolescent brain development contribute to social and emotional behaviour at this time of life?
Mentalising abilities are fully developed by the age of 5 years. Discuss.
How does puberty play a role in social brain development?
What is neuroplasticity? How might it influence social brain development?
What changes in social behaviour occur during this period?
How might we know if adolescence is a sensitive period for social development? What evidence would suggest this?
Why might mental and neural “flexibility” during adolescence be important?
How might the social context influence adolescent brain and behaviour development?
What can neuroimaging techniques tell us about the development of social cognition?