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Why DO teens do THAT? Raging hormones? Prefrontal cortex fully developed? Thrill Seeking? New research from The Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania has released a report explaining Why Teens Take Risks: It's Not a Deficit in Brain Development:
The authors propose an alternative model that emphasizes the role that risk taking and the experience gained by it play in adolescent development. This model explains much of the apparent increase in risk taking by adolescents as "an adaptive need to gain the experience required to assume adult roles and behaviors." That experience eventually changes the way people think about risk, making it more "gist-like" or thematic and making them more risk averse.
"Recent meta-analyses suggest that the way individuals think about risks and rewards changes as they mature, and current accounts of brain development must take these newer ideas into account to explain adolescent risk taking," said co-author Valerie Reyna, Ph.D., director of the Human Neuroscience Institute at Cornell University.
Romer[1] added, "The reason teens are doing all of this exploring and novelty seeking is to build experience so that they can do a better job in making the difficult and risky decisions in later life – decisions like 'Should I take this job?' or 'Should I marry this person?' There's no doubt that this period of development is a challenge for parents, but that's doesn't mean that the adolescent brain is somehow deficient or lacking in control."
[1] Daniel Romer, Ph.D
Daniel Romer, Valerie F. Reyna, Theodore D. Satterthwaite. Beyond stereotypes of adolescent risk taking: Placing the adolescent brain in developmental context. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 2017; 27: 19 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2017.07.007 (Javascript required).
Alternate Link: Science.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday August 28 2017, @09:26PM (7 children)
No, sorry, your dictionary is wrong on this one. Technically, it's correct from an etymological point-of-view ("polygyny" is one-man-many-women, "polyandry" is one-women-many-men, "polygamy" is gender-neutral), however in actual usage it just doesn't work that way: when almost anyone hears the term "polygamy", what they really think you're talking about is polygyny (and it's kinda hard to hear the difference between "polgyny" and "polygamy" anyway). Moreover, ask 100 people on the street what "polygamy" is, and then ask them what "polygyny" is: they'll say the first is one-man-multiple-women, and for the second they'll say "huh?".
So if you talk to people in the actual polyamory community, who actually practice it, they do not like the polygamy term at all for this reason, and "polyamory" is a large umbrella term that says nothing about the commitment level of the relationship, and just means non-monogamous relationships basically.
Wiktionary defines polyamory as "Any of various practices involving romantic or sexual relationships with multiple partners with the knowledge and consent of all involved."
And it has, for definition #5 under "polygamy", "Commonly used specifically for polygyny, the marriage of a man to more than one wife, or the practice of having several wives, at the same time. "
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 29 2017, @12:13AM (6 children)
I'll note that definitions 1 through 4 on Wiktionary make no mention of gender bias, through granted 3 and 4 are scientific rather than social definitions. But considering that Wikipedia mentions that out of 1045 societies noted to practice polygamy in the 1998 Ethnographic Atlas, only 4 practice polyandry, I suppose it is a reasonable assumption.
However, I still say polyamory is *not* a substitute term, as it does not imply the same level of commitment. Perhaps it's currently the best available though.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday August 29 2017, @03:10AM (5 children)
How does it not imply the same level of commitment? Because the term doesn't specify marriage (the "gam" part of polygamy)? How would that help? It's illegal in all places where polyamory is practiced to legally marry more than one person, so the whole thing is moot. It's kinda hard to have a 6-person marriage for example if the state won't recognize it. Go talk to some actual polyamorists and ask them about your assumption of it not having the same level of commitment and I think you'll hear an earful. Try reddit's /r/polyamory for starters.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 29 2017, @03:18PM (4 children)
Exactly - because of the -gam. And what the state respects is irrelevant except when dealing with the state - marriage at its core is a pledge of long-term commitment between the people involved, everything else is politics.
That's not to say that polyamorous relationships can't have the same level of commitment, but that commitment isn't implied by the term. There's plenty of people in casual polyamorous relationships as well, and the term applies to them with equal validity.
And while there are plenty of people who might describe themselves as in casual monogamous relationships, they are misusing that term - again because of the -gam.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday August 29 2017, @04:10PM (3 children)
Now you're being pedantic, and quite wrong.
The -gam is only useful for understanding the etymology of that word. But it does not define it. This is English: the definition of a word is defined solely by its popular usage, not its etymology. If everyone in America tomorrow decided that "monogamous" means having multiple casual sex partners, and used the word that way consistently, then that's exactly what it would mean, despite the obvious etymology which indicates exactly the opposite. If everyone in America tomorrow decided that a "square" was a geometric figure with 5 vertices (what we now call a pentagon), then that's what a square would be.
I've noticed that techies seem to have a real problem with this concept. This isn't French, where words are defined by some committee of academic elitists. English doesn't work that way. If people describe themselves as being in casual monogamous relationships, and other people understand the meaning of that and accept that definition, then that's the correct definition.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 29 2017, @05:02PM (2 children)
You are not completely incorrect - though the fact of the matter is that you'll never get such a decision overnight and so it's pretty much always a long slow decline while a growing body of people abuse a term to the confusion of all, while others push back in the name of consistency and sanity - especially when a word actually contains its literal definition within its component parts.
Has little to do with my main point in that post though - that polyamorous is categorically *not* a term that implies any level of commitment.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday August 29 2017, @07:41PM (1 child)
though the fact of the matter is that you'll never get such a decision overnight and so it's pretty much always a long slow decline
Well yes, of course. It takes a while for the meaning of a word to shift. But look at the word "gay"; 60+ years ago it just meant "happy", and now it means something totally different.
especially when a word actually contains its literal definition within its component parts.
How about the word "decimate"? The literal meaning of that word is to reduce by 1/10 (to eliminate one-tenth of it). Now it means to totally destroy something, in English. But the word is Latin in origin and had a very specific meaning in Roman times.
that polyamorous is categorically *not* a term that implies any level of commitment.
That I agree with totally. As it is used today, even by (and especially by) people in that lifestyle, it's a big umbrella term that includes all sorts of non-monogamous relations of varying levels of commitment. It's not meant to be specific at all. But my point from before was that the "polygamy" term is really quite shunned by polyamorists, and they'll even be offended if you call them polygamists, because of the religious and patriarchal connotations (from definition 5 discussed before). The word's origin isn't important, it's the word's current popular definition/usage and associations.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday August 30 2017, @03:17AM
Yep, good solid words are lost to new meanings all the time - that's no reason not to fight if the mood takes you ;-)
As for decimate - interestingly it specifically referred to killing 1 in 10 in a group as a punishment to the whole group - a practice which would tend to quickly decimate (modern definition) either the population or their will to continue on their course. Perhaps the definition hasn't actually changed as much as it first appears...