Studying individual differences in human adolescent brain development
Open accessAbstract
Adolescence is a period of social, psychological and biological development. During adolescence, relationships with others become more complex, peer relationships are paramount and social cognition develops substantially. These psychosocial changes are paralleled by structural and functional changes in the brain. Existing research in adolescent neurocognitive development has focused largely on averages, but this obscures meaningful individual variation in development. In this Perspective, we propose that the field should now move toward studying individual differences. We start by discussing individual variation in structural and functional brain development. To illustrate the importance of considering individual differences in development, we consider three sources of variation that contribute to neurocognitive processing: socioeconomic status, culture and peer environment. To assess individual differences in neurodevelopmental trajectories, large-scale longitudinal datasets are required. Future developmental neuroimaging studies should attempt to characterize individual differences to move toward a more nuanced understanding of neurocognitive changes during adolescence.
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The human brain undergoes substantial and protracted development across adolescence.
“Extensive research using brain imaging has shown that the human brain undergoes substantial and protracted development across adolescence. 122”
From The Lancet Psychiatry Commission on youth mental health (2024) · cites this paper as [122]
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“…in the timing and trajectories of various regions in both intercept (e.g., overall cortical thickness level) and slope (e.g., changes over time) (Foulkes & Blakemore, 2018; Mills et al., 2021) which are at least partly in fl uenced by puberty (Goddings et al., 2014; Vijayakumar et al., 2018).”
- Authors
- Foulkes, L., & Blakemore, S.-J.
- Affiliations
- University College London (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Blakemore, Sarah-Jayne
- Venue
- Nature Neuroscience
- Published
- 2018-02-05
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 315-323
- ISSN
- 1097-6256 (ISSN-L)
- 1546-1726
- OpenAlex
- W2791610189
- Cited by
- 413
- References
- 16
- Citations by year
- 2026: 25 · 2025: 46 · 2024: 53 · 2023: 57 · 2022: 44 · 2021: 58 · 2020: 52 · 2019: 53 · 2018: 25
- FWCI
- 6.28
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- Locations
- Nature Neuroscience (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- White Rose Research Online (University of Leeds, The University of Sheffield, University of York) (acceptedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- Apollo (University of Cambridge) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Apollo
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Functional Brain Connectivity Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Keywords
- individual differences, adolescent brain development, neurocognitive development, socioeconomic status, cultural influences on development, peer environment, neurodevelopmental trajectories, longitudinal neuroimaging, social cognition
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Brain, Child, Culture, Female, Humans, Individuality, Male, Social Class, Adolescent Development, Young Adult
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