Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

When Does Maturity Set In?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the some-people-never-get-there dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Two Dartmouth researchers claim that they are one step closer to discovering at what age human maturity sets in. From the article: 'For the study, Baird and graduate student Craig Bennett looked at the brains of nineteen 18-year-old Dartmouth students who had moved more than 100 miles to attend college. A control group of 17 older students, ranging in age from 25 to 35, were also studied for comparison. The results indicate that significant changes took place in the brains of these individuals. The changes were localized to regions of the brain known to integrate emotion and cognition. Specifically, these are areas that take information from our current body state and apply it for use in navigating the world.'"

3 of 300 comments (clear)

  1. Think about why car insurance gets cheaper at 35 by aegilops · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There has to be a statistical reason why your car insurance is so absurdly high when you're a late teen, with a steady decrease before a significant reduction at the age of 35. Certainly your appetite for risk behind the wheel doesn't completely reflect your all round maturity in life, but I'd suggest a strong correlation.

    Aegilops

  2. Control group? by nordelius · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Maybe I'm missing something, but wouldn't a suitable control group comprise 18 year olds who didn't go to college? As the experiment stands, you could argue either that:

    a) going to college changes your brain
    b) being 18 and full of hormones changes your brain
    c) both to varying extents

    --
    -- "You never mentioned comets before, Mac. This opens up a whole new area of negotiation." - Gordon Urquart
  3. Re:It depends... by Retric · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "nineteen 18-year-old Dartmouth students who had moved more than 100 miles to attend college" vs "A control group of 17..."

    With a sample size that small you realy can't tell anything specific.

    I don't know how they can try and publish a study where they look at such a small sample size, and assume the diffrence between the older and younger group's brain is based on maturity. Now if they had tracked 100 people from age 12 to 30 and compared brain scans with their behavior they could get good data but this study is worthless.