Phoebe Prince Case

Hey guys,

Just stumbled across this--they just decided the sentences for Phoebe Prince's bullies. Check it out.

Sammy

Sociopathy!

Over the last week I've seen two movies that show two very different sociopaths. If anyone gets a chance I highly recommend either/both.

The Good Son (1993), starring Macaulay Culkin and Elijah Wood

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107034/

And

Peeping Tom (1960), Karlheinz Bohm

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054167/

Both are on Netflix Instant Watch

Psychopathology and Spring Birth

Great BBC article for today.

From Oli

So, in relation to your recent email (and the blog mentions that followed) concerning morality: I don't really remember much talk of it in the Monday class (might have been on Wednesday? or is my memory already going?), but I thought this might be interesting to some people. I am a devoted NPR RadioLab listener, and I remember a few years ago they produced a whole episode on morality. The way they present their topics is always really interesting and well-worth the time, even if only for amusement, so, hey!, here's some fun listening to relax to. Just a note--I have caught a few mistakes on occasion in some RadioLab episodes, so they're not the final word on anything, but definitely worth a listen. Here's a link to the morality episode:
http://www.radiolab.org/2007/aug/13/

And to do with the stalking topic that has gone on for a little while now--I keep meaning to post this. Sonata Arctica, one of my two most favorite bands, likes to write song lyrics from various points of view for various situations, and they have a tendency of writing sets of songs using the same perspective to make somewhat vague, but definitely existent story lines out of them. One of these sets, which I like to call the "Dana set," is maybe a handful of songs randomly spread out over a few albums that all seem to follow (in my opinion) the story of a guy who falls in love with a girl (Dana), either has a really short relationship or a nonexistent relationship, and then continues to obsess about her, stalk her, and then, eventually, kill her. Sonata never actually released anything publicly about their specific intentions for the storyline, so which of their songs should be included in the story and which shouldn't can be debated over, but for this post I've picked out the lyrics of a few of the songs that I definitely stick into the Dana's stalker plot. I think it's really, really interesting how the lyrics are written from such a perspective-- I definitely feel like I understand what this guy might be thinking, and feel kinda bad for him, even though he's kinda crazed and ready to kill.

-Letter to Dana: This song is an interesting one that covers a wide timespan, with each verse kinda being a few years after the other. If read in the context of what we know comes later, it can be a little creepy, especially with lines like "I promise you... I won't write again 'til the sun sets behind your grave". The song actually includes a verse written after Dana's death, which still fits perfectly into the whole line of the story, if you take his "I heard you passed away" as a sidestep of the fact that he killed her.
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/sonataarctica/ecliptica.html#7
-Shy: I'm not actually sure where I want to put this one, but it's definitely part of the Dana story, so I'm including it for you to read. It could be while he's stalking her, or when he decides he wants to go find her, or when he finally finds her one day (after the apparent restraining order situation that's made obvious in a later song). Or it could be after he's killed her and freaking out about seeing someone who reminds him of Dana... I don't know. What do you think?
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/sonataarctica/takatalvi.html#4
-The End of This Chapter: This song goes at the point in the plot when our stalker's called Dana, presumably already from just outside her house (the song ends with him inside her house in her room with her). This song could maybe switch spots with the next one, especially because of it's title, but I still think the next one definitely comes after.
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/sonataarctica/silence.html#4
-Don't Say a Word: This (by the way) is actually one of my favorite songs (not so much for the lyrics but for how awesome it is live in concert or for highway driving). This one's right before he actually kills Dana, possibly on a second visit to Dana's house (after the visit in "End of This Chapter", because of the line "Unlike the last time here, I now have the means and a will sincere
Your knight is nowhere near" implying he'd been there before but couldn't do it, and her new husband/whatever was probably around). He's definitely rationalizing a purely emotional decision in this song.
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/sonataarctica/reckoningnight.html#5
-The Misery: Okay, so I'm not sure if this fits at all, but it might. There are several songs in the discography talking about writing love songs, stories, and plays based on a character, but I don't know which specifically fit in... so here's one example.
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/sonataarctica/winterheartsguild.html#5

There are quite a few more songs that could potentially fit in with this plot, but I'm not sure, and this one's been lengthy enough already. Just thought some of you guys might find the perspective taken pretty interesting. I love the combination of "love" and power over her, and the obvious tendency toward obsession (I think the lyrics show it pretty well).
Enjoy!

Sexuality and Morality

So this study was pretty interesting in that it looked at disgust for moral and sexual transgressions as separate entities. Yet, their findings suggest that sexual transgressions carry moral implications for female college students, though not so much for males. Moreover, when examining adults, older women are more disgusted by sexual transgressions than their younger counterparts. Which makes it seem that society is creating sex-specific rules of morality that overlap with sexuality.

Inmates and Organ Donations

This is a really interesting article. I never knew that inmates weren't allowed to donate their organs after receiving a death sentence. Some inmates have been able to donate their organs, but it was if they died in a hospital. My main problem with this is that a killer's kidney is no different from a non-killer's kidney. One woman quoted in the article says that she wouldn't care even if she had to have a killer's heart transplanted into her. Many people are desperate for any organ donation. There may be something different in a killer's brain, but we aren't talking about doing brain transplants. That wouldn't work out for a variety of other reasons. I just do not understand why a liver or kidney transplant, for example, can't be done.

Hot Fingers

Some of you may remember the study that was talked about a few years back on the relative length of a woman's fingers, and her (suspected) exposure to androgens in the womb....well, the plot thickens....

http://news.discovery.com/human/men-ring-finger-attractive-women-110420.html

A few more thoughts on stalking

Sorry for another email, but I just found this great website that talks all about cyberstalking and the law enforcement dealing with it. It's a bit dated but I think the information is still applicable. Here is the link:

http://www.justice.gov/criminal/cybercrime/cyberstalking.htm

Also, the article that I will post below is actually about a teacher at my middle school who was arrested when I was in 7th grade for a cyber pedophile-type offense. Never a dull moment in Westchester.

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2003-02-27/news/18231681_1_undercover-westchester-coaches


again-- these are from Julia A. -- not from me-- she was just having trouble posting!

Stalking--

Hi guys-- I know these are slightly long-- but really worth reading if you have any interest in understanding more of the dynamics involved in stalking-- Christy B wrote the first Piece and Christina D wrote the second-- they are both great--

also the link about alpha dog that is to MSNBC dateline is the one that i found to be most comprehensive although christy and Kayla have both posted some other great links!

The first article I read was a study by Purcell, Pathe, and Mullen (2001) who compared female to male stalkers, with an emphasis on the characteristics of female stalkers in particular, since they are the minority. They looked at 40 female and 150 male stalkers who were referred to a forensic mental health clinic, so out of the total 190 stalker sample only 21% were female. In terms of demographics they didn’t differ on anything except that female stalkers were significantly less likely to have a history of criminal offenses. A significant number of participants were diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder, with the most common being: delusional disorders, dependent personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, and narcissistic personality disorder. This makes sense because each one of these disorders could directly relate to stalking behavior.

The duration of stalking and frequency of associated violence was the same between male and female stalkers. However, there were two main differences between the groups: the nature of the relationship with the victim and the methods of harassment. First, female stalkers were more likely to target someone they already knew but weren’t in an intimate relationship with- usually a professional contact such as a therapist or doctor, as the care from these individuals could be misconstrued as romantic interest. Males, on the other hand, tended to target strangers or previous intimate partners. The authors concluded that females want to establish intimacy with the victim while males want to maintain it. One possible reason for this difference is that females in general will pursue potential romantic partners longer than males will, and stalking is when this pursuit goes to the extreme. Males don’t invest the time into the pursuit and will often move on and find someone else (so the pursuit can’t be taken to an extreme if it never really begins), but perhaps once they start a relationship with an individual there is more incentive to make it last, hence the stalking of an ex-romantic partner.

Second, in terms of methods males tended to follow their victims more, while females preferred telephone calls. However, there were overall all no significant differences in the propensity for the stalkers to threaten or attack their victims. The researchers did find that male stalkers are more likely to move from verbal threats to actual physical assault, but this difference could simply due to the fact that males have more chances to physically attack their victim as they are following them, while females can harass their victims from a distant location through the phone. I don’t know if this is true for adult men, but teenage males tend to take more risks and be more impulsive than females, and it is much riskier to follow a victim than it is to simply call them.


The second article (Meloy & Fisher, 2005) discussed the neurobiology of stalking, but it wasn’t an actual empirical study. Perhaps I’m being too critical, but I would imagine that if one wanted to determine the neurological correlates of stalking, he or she would perform some sort of neuroimaging study with a sample of stalkers who were referred to a forensic mental health clinic, akin to the sample in the first study. However, for some reason perhaps due to lack of resources or time, the researchers did not do this. Instead, they simply assumed that the neurological mechanisms involved in early-stage intense romantic love would be the same ones that are involved in stalking. I can see why this might be the case as both stalkers and individuals experiencing early-stage intense romantic love become infatuated with and obsessively think about the person they so desire, but the fact that early-stage romantic lovers AREN’T stalkers shouldn’t be ignored. Perhaps one could argue that the only reason early-stage intense romantic lovers aren’t considered stalkers is because the object of their affection returns their feelings, but even when they are rejected by/break up with the person they love these individuals don’t subsequently assume stalking behavior. There is something “special” about stalkers that makes them overly obsessed with an individual without due cause and/or unable to cope with being rejected by a former/potential intimate.

I suppose I can’t be too harsh, though, as the article only claims to be, “Some thoughts on the neurobiology of stalking”. It never declares to have found out any answers, but it does offer hypotheses. Of course, I had to wait until the very last page for these hypotheses, so until then I was just angry at the article for not giving me the information I wanted. They first covered the same changes in neurological activity during early-stage intense romantic love we discussed last Monday: increased activity in the VTA and caudate nucleus, increased dopamine, and decreased serotonin- the former three being related to reward-seeking behavior and the latter related to obsessive thinking. It does make a lot of sense that these same changes would (and probably do) occur in stalkers. But what are the abnormal biological or developmental issues that result in stalking behavior? Could it be that these neurological changes are brought to an extreme and/or that they don’t back to normal after being rejected? The authors offer some interesting hypotheses:

1.) Stalkers may have a different ratio between activities of central dopamine and serotonin, which could result in more tenacious reward-seeking and obsessive behavior than normal.
2.) Past research has found that stalkers have insecure attachments, so the authors suggest that the oxytocin and vasopressin levels in female and male stalkers may be lower and should be examined, as these hormones are related to bonding behaviors.
3.) There might be some link between stalking and impulse control. If this is the case then it would make sense if teenagers more frequently engaged in stalking behavior, but the first study I read said that the mean age of male and female stalkers was about 37 years, so there must be more involved than just a lack of impulse control.

The article was published in 2005 and to my knowledge is the most recent information on the neurobiology of stalking. I hope that at least some research has been done in the past six years, though, as there is still much to be discovered. As we mentioned in class, it would be interesting to see if there are any neurological differences between male and female stalkers, but I think the neurobiology of stalking in general needs to be further researched first.


AND ALSO.....


Six basic types of stalking have been identified (Mullen et al 2006). 1) Rejected stalkers usually commence stalking after the breakdown of an intimate (usually sexual) romantic relationship. Their motives alternate between a desire for reconciliation and wanting revenge. 2) Intimacy seekers seek a relationship with someone who they love and are convinced returns their feelings. This is the category of perpetrators who on average stalk for the longest period of time, and into which the majority of female stalkers fall. 3) The incompetent stalker also seeks intimacy, but instead of a relationship they usually seek a single date or sexual encounter. A lot of the socially incompetent fall into this category, and their behavior is categorized by feeling entitled to a relationship while being indifferent to the feelings of their victim. 4) The resentful stalker wants to frighten their victim or exact revenge for a real or imagined slight, and get satisfaction from feelings of power and control over their victim. These stalkers frequently threaten their victims, but are the least likely of all the groups to physically attack them. Finally 6) predatory stalkers pursue their victim with the intention of assaulting them, usually sexually.

Predatory stalkers stalk for the shortest period of time, but have the highest incident of committing assault, while resentful and intimacy seeking stalkers stalk for much longer periods of time, but have the lowest incident of assault. Stalking has been found to be the most psychologically damaging to the victim when the stalker is an ex-partner, probably because in those cases the stalker knows more about the victim and how best to frighten them (McEwan et al 2009).

The Purcell et al article was really interesting because the results demonstrated that stalking by juveniles is correlated with a higher incidence of violent assaults than stalking by adults. The majority of perpetrators in the study were male (mean age 15.4 years), the majority of victims were female (mean age 18.8 years), and most victims knew the perpetrator. Interestingly, 57% of the cases involved same gender stalking, with females being more likely than males to stalk someone of the same gender. Females were also more likely to enlist the help of other people in stalking their target.

Among juveniles the most common cause of stalking was as a continuation of bullying, and males and females perpetrated this type of stalking equally, as they did with the next most common motive for stalking, retaliation for a perceived slight. The gender similarities end here. Males were more likely to be perpetrators and females victims in all other stalking categories - rejected stalking following the termination of a romantic relationship, predatory stalking, stalking by the psychologically disturbed, and, unlike what was found in the Mullen and McEwan studies, in intimacy seeking stalking. It should be noted that the intimacy seeking group was small (n=6), but like the intimacy seeking adults, they stalked for the longest continuous periods of time. Overall, there was a higher incidence of physical assault among juvenile stalkers than among the adult populations studied in the other papers, even though the populations studied in the McEwan study were stalkers who had been referred to a forensic mental health clinic, suggesting a more psychologically disturbed population than the juveniles studied in Purcell's paper. In fact, only 8 (out of 299) of the juvenile stalkers in Purcell's study had been diagnosed with a mental illness (though the possibility of mental illness was suggested for a significant minority).

All of these studies, Purcell's especially, seem to reaffirm my idea that males stalk people to exert power and control over their victim, or to harass someone who rejected them romantically, more often than females do. It is interesting to note that a majority of the intimacy seeking stalkers (again, most of the females were in this category) in McEwan's study were diagnosed with a mental illness, and also that they did not express a desire to harm their victim. It was only in the juvenile study that some females reported a desire to harm their victim, and their victims were usually other girls. It would be interested to look at stalking among the mean girls and boys population, no? But anyway, I'm sensing from what I'm reading that while both genders may stalk in equal numbers, it is overwhelmingly men who stalk with the purpose of frightening or harming their victim, except in juveniles. I'd love to see if Purcell's results could be replicated, because they raise the question of what happens to girls as they grow up. The incidence of males stalking females seemingly doesn't decrease from adolescence to adulthood, but the incidence of females stalking people in order to scare or hurt them goes way down (and I think is higher among teens than a lot of people realize). Do girls really just grow out of it? Are they socialized out of it? Do they have less of a need to soothe their egos by hurting people they perceive to have slighted them, and if so, why? I'd also like to look exclusively at female stalkers, and see what percentage of them have been diagnosed with a mental illness, and if it's higher than the percentage of male stalkers who have a diagnosable mental illness. Above all I think way more research needs to be done on juvenile stalking, because I'm sure it's more prevalent and more harmful than people realize.

For those of you who want more information on the tragic true story behind the movie Alpha Dog!

To add to the previous post...

Hey guys, I had no idea that Alpha Dog was based on a true story, so I decided to find some more information on it. Here are all of the websites I looked at, if you are also interested. I highly recommend #2 and #4, if you don't wanna read everything. Since this contains a lot of spoilers (or rather, the entire plot of the film), I suggest that people in Wednesday's class don't read this until after.

1.) All of these wikipedia pages give more information about the real life murder of Nick Markowitz (AKA: Zack in the movie):

-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Dog (Has a chart where it shows the movie character name, actor, and then real life name and outcome- this is the same link that the previous post contained)
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Markowitz
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_James_Hollywood (Johnny Truelove in the movie)
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Rugge (Frankie in the movie)
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_Hoyt (Elvis in the movie)

And as you'll see on these pages Professor Baird remembered correctly- most of the gang members were 20 or 21.

2.) This article gives some more info on the real crime and the people involved. Seriously, there is so much information and it offers a lot of insight into the individuals, so I suggest you read this first:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16636250/ns/dateline_nbc/

3.) This is the website that Nick's mom Susan made. It includes info about what happened and the outcomes of the offenders (with Susan's comments here and there), as well as pictures of Nick and poems Susan wrote (as you can see there are quite a few of them- they were probably therapeutic for her):
http://nicholasmarkowitz.com/

It's really tragic because she now defines herself through her son. She's no longer Susan Markowitz, but "Nick's Mom Susan"- she refers to herself as this on both her facebook and myspace pages.

4.) Here's an article Susan wrote in 2010 about what she had to go through:
http://www.independent.com/news/2010/feb/06/letter-susan-markowitz/

One memorable quote from this article that echos back to what Professor Baird told us to think about in class is, "Jesse James Hollywood should have been charged with two murders— mine as well as my son's."

5.) Annnnd here's the book Susan wrote:
http://www.amazon.com/My-Stolen-Son-Markowitz-Berkley/dp/042523634X


Finally, I'll end this with a fun fact from IMDB concerning the film Alpha Dog:
"The word "fuck" and its derivatives is said 367 times."
I wonder who bothered to count?


-Christy

Alpha Dog's True Story

Hey, I found this article on Alpha Dog from Wikipedia. At the bottom it has a list of all the real-life counterparts to each character and jail times, ages, etc.

Love is not sexting.

"LACEY, Wash. — One day last winter Margarite posed naked before her bathroom mirror, held up her cellphone and took a picture. Then she sent the full-length frontal photo to Isaiah, her new boyfriend.
Both were in eighth grade.
They broke up soon after. A few weeks later, Isaiah forwarded the photo to another eighth-grade girl, once a friend of Margarite’s. Around 11 o’clock at night, that girl slapped a text message on it.
“Ho Alert!” she typed. “If you think this girl is a whore, then text this to all your friends.” Then she clicked open the long list of contacts on her phone and pressed “send.”
In less than 24 hours, the effect was as if Margarite, 14, had sauntered naked down the hallways of the four middle schools in this racially and economically diverse suburb of the state capital, Olympia. Hundreds, possibly thousands, of students had received her photo and forwarded it."

Read the rest: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/27/us/27sexting.html?pagewanted=print

Responses to the article are also really great: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/opinion/l03sext.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print

Look What I Found!

I thought this map appropriate, considering our recent discussions of romantic love in the brain. Visual learners, this is for you.

Speak

Last weekend I saw the movie Speak starring Kristen Stewart. It's a pretty powerful movie about a young girl in high school dealing with the aftereffects of being raped at a party, and calling the cops, which resulted in the party being busted. It's not exactly related to romantic love, but does address a bit of violence in lust and relationships in adolescents.

The whole movie can be found on youtube. Here's the first link if anyone feels like watching it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OFtBXyeTNU

The Benefits of Peer Pressure

Could it be that peer pressure is not actually a malicious force that parents must shelter their innocent children from, but on the contrary a positive experience that may even be evolutionarily adaptive? This extremely relevant and interesting article suggests just that, as it tackles our conception of peer pressure as a highly negative phenomenon in adolescence, and discusses the potential benefits peer pressure may have. Those who do experience peer pressure, the article suggests, learn how to behave in reciprocal relationships, and develop empathy and social adeptness. For instance, the article cites the hygiene of adolescent males as an example, suggesting that without peer pressure teenage boys would quite possibly never shower.

The article also presents the findings of an interesting study that asks its adolescent participants and their best friends to imagine a hypothetical trip to Mars, in which they must together agree upon which passengers they will save on their spaceship. The article explains that those who perform well on this task will in the future have higher GPAs, higher involvement in healthy romantic relationships, and lower problems with alcohol and drugs. The article then concludes that these findings demonstrate a positive correlation between peer pressure and the aforementioned benefits (GPA, healthy relationships, etc.) However, I believe the article's portrayal of this is misleading, as it seems that it isn't the amount of peer pressure that is a predictor of these positive outcomes, but rather an adolescent's ability to handle the peer pressure. I do, however, agree with the positive remarks the authors have made about peer pressure, as well as their distinction between peer pressure and peer selection. If you are surrounded by the 'right' peers, you may be pressured to act or behave in a way that is positive or healthy (ie-study groups with friends). The article also suggests that those who are more likely to engage in risky behaviors like drinking or doing drugs, tend to select peer groups who are also interested in these activities as well. Although my class did not watch and discuss thirteen yet, from what I recall the main character is at first a studious, innocent girl, who is later corrupted by her more provocative and risk-seeking friend. It is interesting to apply this concept to this protagonist and question whether or not she had an innate vulnerability or propensity to make these poor judgment calls since she surrounded herself with a friend who was such a bad influence, or if she truly was 'corrupted.'

Please read the article and let me know what you think! Also feel free to correct my interpretation of the movie since I have not seen it in a while.

Sam

Eating Disorders-- dormant during adolescence, yet emerging in adulthood

Check out this article from yesterday’s NY Times:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/28/an-older-generation-falls-prey-to-eating-disorders/?pagemode=print

I thought it was really interesting--- while not directly related to adolescent development, it made me wonder:

What was adolescence like for individuals who develop eating disorders during mid to late adulthood for the first time? (aka not a relapse)

Did they miss various developmental milestones during adolescence, and are now just revisiting them as older adults? (Ex/ acquiring sense of self, acceptance of one’s physique, understanding of one’s body, acquiring interpersonal skills)

What do you all think?

Physical and Emotional Pain= all the same in the brain

This article makes me wonder whether cutting is prevalent among adolescent girls because it mimics internal emotional pain that can't necessarily be appropriately expressed. It's also interesting to think that future treatments for psychiatric issues could be physically based and physical problems can be treated with emotional boosters. Do you guys think that maybe having more adolescents involved in sports (since physical activity has been found to increase mood-boosting hormones and decrease self-reports of somatic pain)could reduce cutting frequency or risk by acting as a physical outlet for internal pain?
Britt

From Lillian Reuman

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/print/292806.htm


The article discusses a concept of "macchiato mothers" -- essentially these mothers are stereotypical well-off, controlling mothers of young children. The main issue is that they have developed BUSINESS CARDS to share with parents of their childs friends so that they can better schedule play dates, etc. Anyway, I thought the gist of the article tied in well with the notion of "intervening parents" and over-involvement as emphasized by the New York Times article that you assigned us for class.

Race to Nowhere

Hi, all -

In the event that you'd like to see the documentary, Race to Nowhere, before it's widely released, a number of screenings across the country are scheduled during spring break. Below is the link to the documentary website with information about the scheduled screenings. Many of us are headed home for break, and there might be a screening near you!

http://www.racetonowhere.com/screenings

Emily P.

Arcuate Fasiculus

While reading "The Terrible Twelves" (Baird), I found myself wanting to know more (or perhaps not remembering enough from Physio...) about several parts of the brain she mentions.  While re-educating myself about the arcuate fasiculus, I came across Deric Bownds fantastic "MindBlog": http://mindblog.dericbownds.net.  More specifically, a post about said fasiculus, and it's role in the evolution of language in humans.  To quote Bownds:

"Rilling et al found that the organization of cortical terminations between the temporal and frontal lobes was strongly modified in the course of human evolution, and, crucially, this modification was gradual. They also noted a prominent temporal lobe projection of the human arcuate fasciculus that is much smaller or absent in nonhuman primates. This human specialization may be relevant to the evolution of language." (Bownds)

 This specific post, which includes some confusing-but-interesting comparative diagrams of human, chimp, and macaque brains, can be found here: http://mindblog.dericbownds.net/2008/04/language-evolution-and-arcuate.html

---Ben Palacios

'Star crossed lovers'?

Over the weekend the subject of Mary Kay Letourneau, the 32 year old school teacher who had a sexual relationship with her 13 year old student, came up randomly in conversation. It struck me as interesting especially after discussing maturation and development over adolescence in class this week. It's such a bizarre situation, and there are so many questions that can be asked about this relationship. Is it really possible for a 13 year old boy to have the capacity to understand romantic love and relationships? Isn't one of the purposes of adolescence to sort of work these things out before adulthood? Did he really get a chance to do these things? Not to mention questions about Letourneau's state of mind and reasoning, as well as implications for the legal system.

After she served her 7 1/2 year jail sentence, Mary Kay and her student, Vili Fualaau, got married and are still currently married. This story also stood out to me because in several news pieces they are referred to as "star-crossed lovers" and are compared to Romeo and Juliet. Is this a story of true love, or is this a damaging angle to take?

This is a biography of Mary Kay, it's kind of long but interesting:

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/psychology/marykay_letourneau/10.html

Interview with Fualaau, and the next video is about their wedding:

http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/today-exclusive-vili-fualaau/6yge6x4

Partial interview with MK and Vili on 'Aftermath with William Shatner' (Warning: Shatner's a bit creepy:

http://www.zimbio.com/watch/4Yme5egkB1U/William+Shatner+Explores+Letourneau+Fualaau/William+Shatner

Risk-Taking & Marraige

I thought this was an interesting article about risk taking. I used to be a bit confused about young women marrying older men, but after the discussion last class, it doesn't seem like such a bad idea as far as brain maturation is concerned.

http://www.buffalo.edu/news/10060

Does "illegality" make drinking a more desirable risk?

In brainstorming factors that influence perceptions of risky-behavior, I couldn't help but wonder whether the mere fact that alcohol is illegal serves as a reason for adolescents to engage in the "deviant/risky" behavior. College officials have proposed the Amethyst Initative, which (I believe) essentially aims to lower the drinking age in order to curb binge drinking on campus and encourage "responsible" drinking as demonstrated by peers in countries with a lower legal drinking age.

http://www.amethystinitiative.org/

Thoughts?!

Mean Girls Do Grow Up

Hey all! I stumbled across this article on Mean Girls/"mean girls"... It seems interesting, and definitely attributes the "meanness" of mean girls to adolescence and not general feminine nature (which has been done, and is quite sexist IMO). Enjoy!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/11/AR2011021104947_2.html?sid=ST2011021604365

Risk taking test

Found this online and thought it was both interesting and relevant to our readings this week. Enjoy!

Welcome

Adolescence?

Hi There Folks and welcome to the (mysterious...not really) blog.....
here is what you all had to say about this great period of life-- please feel free to comment on any of the definitions-- especially if you have positive or constructive additions or suggestions--


Adolescence is characterized by the physiological, neurological, emotional, and social transition from childhood to adulthood and is one of the most important developmental windows in an individual’s life perhaps second only to the perinatal period. During this time period, an adolescent forms their perceptions and interpretations of social interactions, relationships, and their place in the world, all of which are very fragile and easily influenced by peers, environment, and genetics. Neurologically, adolescence brings a great deal of rapid neurogenesis and pruning throughout various brain regions, which shape mechanisms that influence behavior and cognition for the rest of adulthood.

Adolescence: The transitional stage of human development between childhood and adulthood in which an individual progresses towards more advanced physical, emotional, cognitive, and social human states. It is often seen as a stressful and emotionally intense period of development that depends largely on cultural definitions of an individual's defined role in society.

The layout of adolescence is like Tokyo. The city, once merely a quaint fishing village, now has a population of over 13 million people and boasts some of the most dazzling enterprises in the world— an incredible feat given the city’s lack of street signs. Going through adolescence is like moving from Wisconsin to Tokyo: you have to rely heavily on others to help you read your map, and then give you directions after you throw away said map. One day you’ll acclimate, and one you’ll be able to find your apartment; but till then, you're left scrabbling to learn the language, customs, and streets.

Adolescence-- a time in which an individual emerges from a child to an adult through self-discovery; this self-discovery develops from seeking novel experiences, experimentation, and teaching others about the self.

Awkward time by definition. In humans, is the transitional state between childhood and reproductive adulthood, physically and otherwise; the social responsibilities of those two stages of life are so different, and it switches so suddenly, that the only bridge between them is hasty and vague, can afford a person only so much delicacy.

Some may think of adolescence as the transitional stage between childhood and adulthood, but it serves an important function that deserves more attention than the title of a moody transition. The biological changes that occur in puberty motivate individuals to think and feel differently than they had felt before the physical changes. They develop better cognitive and rationalization skills and learn how to use their new ways of thinking to change the ways they look at their relationships and encounters. Without this stage, the individual would not have the opportunity to experiment with his or her new knowledge and learn to deal with more adult challenges.

Adolescence is the transitional period marking the end of childhood. It begins with the initiation of puberty and completes when adulthood is achieved (early adolescence ~10-14 years and late adolescence ~15-19 years). Such a stage is coupled with psychological, biological and social adjustments, though the biological changes that occur are much more easily noted objectively and, thus, more translatable across subjects.

Adolescence begins with puberty, a little after if you're early, or a little before if you're late. Your biology gives you new tools with which to explore the landscape of your rapidly expanding emotional,physical, cognitive, and relational experience, but takes away your compass and anchor (your complete faith in and dependence on your parents, your naivety, your un-sexualized body), which leaves you more vulnerable, more malleable, and more experimental than ever before.And while this trio (vulnerability, plasticity, and experimentally-proneness) is exactly what you need to teach yourself how to be an adult, the teaching process can be very difficult, sometimes too difficult to complete right away, often depending on chance and circumstance. Adolescence ends when you have practiced using your new biological tools (e.g. a sexual mind and body, a bigger better pre-frontal cortex, a social dynamism, etc.) enough to develop a productive cohesion among them that can help you navigate the uncertainty of your own and your children's lives.

Adolescence is an undisclosed amount of time starting roughly before puberty in which an individual beings to become less dependent on the main caregiver and expresses more self-sufficient behaviors and lasts until the individual can function as an efficient self-sufficient individual, no longer dependent on another for survival.

My definition: Adolescence is a period of time in the human development that begins at puberty and ends with full physical maturation, spanning from around age 7 (in early bloomers for puberty) to 24 (for those who are late fully maturing. It is a time marked by change as the individual becomes not only physically mature but also socially and emotionally. This is typically accompanied by storm and stress in some, depending on the various psychological and genetic factors, as well as and environmental influences present during this time period.

Adolescence is a transitional period between childhood and adulthood. It starts from the production of sex hormones at the beginning of puberty, through teenage years, and through early-adulthood until around 24 years of age. Adolescence is characterized by changes in physical appearance, sex-drive and emotional changes, so basically everything. Although many people think of adolescence and puberty as one and the same, they are not as there is still much growing, physically, mentally and emotionally, that has to be done after puberty in order to gain a consistency with one's being, that is adulthood.

Adolescence is the intermediate stage between childhood and adulthood during which the body, brain, and mind develop in order to eventually function in the adult world (and, in evolutionary terms, to eventually produce healthy, functional offspring who will eventually also have healthy babies). It involves, among other things, development of complex comprehension of adult issues and behaviors, as well as the need to get to know oneself and what is required for the individual to be successful and content.

My definition of adolescence: Occurring, on average, between the ages of 10 and 24 years, adolescence is a period of dramatic physical change, social learning and psychological development. The developments that unfold over the course of this period are instrumental in preparing individuals to function successfully in the adult world. In concert with one another, substantial physical change, neural maturation, and gathered social experience equip individuals with the resources and skills required to meet the demands of adult life.

Adolescence is a time of cognitive and emotional growth marked by increased conflict with parents and authority figures (peaks at about age 15 then declines), mood volatility/variability with an increased likelihood of depressed mood, especially in girls, and an increase in risk seeking and risky behavior, which peaks in late adolescence (18- early twenties). Adolescence is a time when we gain the cognitive capacity to be (hyper)aware of the feelings and behaviors of the people around us, and of how they affect us and how our behavior will be perceived by and affect them. We additionally gain the behavioral knowledge to make decisions about who we are, what we like, and what we stand for, and to contest what we have been told about ourselves and society by parents and other authority figures. We become emotionally volatile, in part due to increased self-consciousness and thus an increased perception of threats to our personhood which may or may not exist, and we also become aware of ourselves and those around us as sexual beings.

A child's teenage years when rapidly developing into an adult. It refers more to an ongoing state of mind than to a specific physical event (puberty refers more to the physical changes occurring during this period).

Adolescence is a period of physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and neurological growth and development catalyzed by the physical changes of puberty. This time can be marked by physical awkwardness due to one's changing body, and it also can involve the storm and stress that has been hypothesized to be associated with adolescence. Necessary to becoming an adult, adolescence could be thought of as a long, rickety bridge between childhood and adulthood.

(quoted/adapted from a definition I found on Psychology Today)

A time of both disorientation and discovery, adolescence describes the teenage years between 13 and 19. However, with increasing rates of early-onset puberty, the preteen or "tween" years (9-12) may also qualify. No longer children but not yet adults, adolescents struggle with issues of independence and self-identity, and often experiment with drugs, alcohol, and sexuality. Peer groups and external appearance tend to increase in importance.

Adolescence is a transitional stage from childhood to adulthood that is characterized by rapid physical, cognitive, and emotional growth and development. This dramatic time period is also inextricably tied to social and cultural factors, which will also affect the way different adolescents will respond to and experience this period of change.

Puberty (pronounced awk-ward)
1. A period of extreme discomfort characterized by ballooning body parts, oddly placed toupe-like hair, and sexual tension aggravated by a plethora of genitala-related hallway jokes. Often accompanied by a semi-paranoid sense that everyone is looking at you and a series of embarrassing parental confrontations.
2. Period of development during which both male and females undergo drastic reproductive maturation accompanied by changes in appearance, biochemical status, and behavioral actions.