Cited by 744Neural and Behavioral Psychology StudiesChild and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional DevelopmentFunctional Brain Connectivity Studies

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 87 of the 94 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; 4 of the 99 sources its claims cite were checked for support.

Adolescent Neurodevelopment

Open access
Spear, Linda Patia·2013·Journal of Adolescent Health

Abstract

PURPOSE: The purpose of this article is to outline notable alterations occurring in the adolescent brain, and to consider potential ramifications of these developmental transformations for public policy and programs involving adolescents. METHODS: Developmental changes in the adolescent brain obtained from human imaging work are reviewed, along with results of basic science studies. RESULTS: Adolescent brain transformations include both progressive and regressive changes that are regionally specific and serve to refine brain functional connectivity. Along with still-maturing inhibitory control systems that can be overcome under emotional circumstances, the adolescent brain is associated with sometimes elevated activation of reward-relevant brain regions, whereas sensitivity to aversive stimuli may be attenuated. At this time, the developmental shift from greater brain plasticity early in life to the relative stability of the mature brain is still tilted more toward plasticity than seen in adulthood, perhaps providing an opportunity for some experience-influenced sculpting of the adolescent brain. CONCLUSIONS: Normal developmental transformations in brain reward/aversive systems, areas critical for inhibitory control, and regions activated by emotional, exciting, and stressful stimuli may promote some normative degree of adolescent risk taking. These findings have a number of potential implications for public policies and programs focused on adolescent health and well-being.

Overview

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2012.05.006

Cites

87 of 87 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

66 Not checked yet · 11 Own interpretation · 11 No basis given · 2 Couldn’t confirm · 1 Partly supported · accuracy not yet measured

Verify all 95 references — free account

Show all 51 claims

  • Probably not a substantial claim. 4
  • It may state two separate claims as one. 36
40 of 40
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Adolescents have enhanced sensitivity to strong rewards.

    “evidence for enhanced sensitivity to strong rewards during adolescence”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Adolescents have attenuated aversive sensitivity.

    “adolescent-associated attenuations in aversive sensitivity”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The surrounding context strongly influences how adolescents behave.

    “Context plays a particularly dramatic role in influencing adolescent behavior”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Stressful, exciting, or emotionally charged situations boost activity in subcortical areas that regulate responses to social-emotional and rewarding cues.

    “stressful, exciting and emotionally arousing circumstances not only increasing activity in subcortical regions modulating reactivity to socioemotional and rewarding stimuli”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Such situations also reduce activity in frontal cortical areas essential for reasoning and cognitive control.

    “but also attenuating activity in regions of the frontal cortical critical for logical thinking and cognitive control”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    This fosters 'hot cognitions' and can contribute to risky behavior.

    “thereby promoting “hot cognitions” and potentially leading to risky activities”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Typical adolescent thinking and behavior are partly rooted in neurobiology.

    “Adolescent-typical ways of thinking and behaving appear in part neurobiologically-based.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    A large number of young people go through adolescence without much difficulty, showing limited risk-taking and few serious negative outcomes.

    “Many youth traverse adolescence relatively easily, with their risk-taking limited and without notable adverse consequences”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    For others, choices made during adolescence lead to serious outcomes such as long-term substance abuse, imprisonment, or death.

    “for other individuals, adolescent behavioral choices have severe consequences, including lasting alcohol/drug abuse, incarceration, or even death”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    It remains largely unknown how adolescent brain development shapes individual differences over adolescence, or how environmental experiences contribute to resilience or vulnerability in particular adolescents.

    “Little is known of how development of the adolescent brain influences expression of individual differences across the course of adolescence, nor of the role of environmental experiences in the emergence of resiliencies and vulnerabilities among individual adolescents.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The environmental conditions an adolescent experiences are important.

    “environmental circumstances of the adolescent matter”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The adolescent brain, as it matures, is responsive to such experiences.

    “the maturing brain during adolescence is sensitive to these experiences”
12 of 12

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Citations

Cites

Show all 94 references

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Metadata

Authors
Spear, L. P.
Affiliations
Binghamton University (US)
Corresponding author
Spear, Linda Patia
Venue
Journal of Adolescent Health
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2013-02
Volume
52
Issue
2
Pages
S7-S13
ISSN
1054-139X (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W4255839518
Cited by
744
References
94
Citations by year
2026: 71 · 2025: 78 · 2024: 71 · 2023: 58 · 2022: 67 · 2021: 75 · 2020: 99 · 2019: 47 · 2018: 44 · 2017: 45 · 2016: 42 · 2015: 21 · 2014: 15 · 2013: 8
FWCI
2.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Journal of Adolescent Health (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
NIH (U01 AA019972, P50 AA017823, R01 AA018026, R01 AA017355, R01 AA 016887)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Functional Brain Connectivity Studies
Keywords
adolescent brain development, functional connectivity, inhibitory control, reward sensitivity, aversive stimuli, neuroplasticity, emotion regulation, risk-taking, adolescent health policy, youth welfare
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adolescent Behavior, Brain, Brain Mapping, Humans, Public Policy, Reward, Risk-Taking, Harm Reduction, Adolescent Development, Neuroimaging

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-10-04, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).

A second model labelled each claim on 2026-10-04 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).

Cited sources are checked with a language model’s help (gpt-6-sol).

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review