The mechanism isn't clear, but this isn't good.
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Adolescent brains naturally go through a maturation process that results in the thickening of the hippocampus, an area involved with memory and concentration, and the amygdala, which regulates emotional processing. At the same time, the cortex — an area that regulates emotional functioning — starts thinning.
The brain scans revealed that this maturation process had moved more quickly in teens who had lived through the pandemic. Gotlib says that their brains appeared three to four years older than the brains of the teens scanned before the start of the pandemic.
Exactly what part of the pandemic may have shaped teen brains is unclear. But “this study shows that the pandemic has had a material impact on brain maturation,” says Joan Luby, a child psychiatrist at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, who wasn’t involved in the research.
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a tip of the hat to Sukie
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