How Teens Get That Way

Finally, a light at the end of childhood. Researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health and UCLA have been exploring how human minds mature, when they do. It's tricky enough just to live this journey, let alone to track it medically for 17 years. The researchers found that parts of the brain's 100 billion neurons matured at different times. This makes intuitive sense to parents, who've watched their babies' progress from babbling infants to inquisitive toddlers …

…before reasoning develops. Now we're getting warm. This explains that galactic void at 13; new teens can't yet use it, so they lose it. The brain doesn't seem to be shrinking. It is. Such data help decode the mysteries of brain diseases like schizophrenia and autism. More immediately, as an explanation for inexplicable behavior, these findings may help parental brains mature, enhancing the patience lobe and shrinking the exasperation sector, causing adult eyes to roll less.