All teenagers are guilty at some point when it comes to texting and driving, a quickly rising reason for car rashes and deaths in the world today. While we as individuals try to make what we think are smart decisions, we often tend to continue doing things that were once rewarding to us, even when the payoff is gone.

Researchers have blamed these flaws in judgment on the immaturity of the teen’s prefrontal cortex which is the part of the brain involved in making decisions. Now, researchers at the University of Iowa in Iowa City say their theory has changed to a simple answer: the idea of rewards. Even if they’re small, rewards tempt teens to act more irrationally than adults.

Psychologist Zachary Roper and his team worked with two groups of volunteers: 13 to 16year olds and 20 to 35year-old adults

Before testing began, the scientists informed the volunteers they had a target. Each had to report the orientation of the line inside a blue diamond. Groups of six symbols appeared on a computer screen, with only one of them being a diamond, and the other five: circles. In some trials, one of the five circles were red or green. In other trials, there were no red or green circles.

The volunteers were told to answer as quickly as possible, with no reward (money) being earned, while the researchers measured how long it took them to find the diamond and record answers.

When no colored circles were one of the options, both adults and teens responded quickly. But when a red or green circle showed up, both groups initially took a bit longer. Adults, quickly stopped paying attention to the colored circles, and their response times sped up. Teens, though, took longer to respond when a red or green circle showed up, and their response time never sped up.

Their attention still was drawn to the previously valued circles, which in a trial prior,the red circles provided a small 2 cent reward while the green circles provided a larger 10 cent reward — even though the shapes no longer brought any reward. Clearly, the red and green circles were distracting teens from their goal.

Brian Anderson, a psychologist at Johns Hopkins University who was no involved in the study says that this data may help explain why teens engage in risky behavior.

Getting a text or using social media triggers the brain’s reward system. Once the brain links the behavior to the reward, we are more compelled to continue to do it. This is why we text while driving when we should be paying attention to the road instead.

Next time you’re driving, remember that your safety is what is most important, and checking your “like’s” on Instagram can wait ten minutes.

https://student.societyforscience.org/article/distracted-teenage-brain?mode=topic&context=39