Teen stress (or, more specifically, unhealthy responses to teen stress) has been associated with a wide range of problems, including teen substance abuse, teen depression and even teen self-harm. Of course, the effort to help teens develop more healthier responses to stress involves identifying the common stressors that affect many teens.
Dr. Adriana Galvan of UCLA is studtying teen and adults stress -- and is focusing her research on physiological responses to stress, and finding differences not only among individuals, but also among age groups. This new research is focused upon normal, daily stress and stress hormones, and how they affect decision-making in adolescence.
- Teens are most likely to be stressed out by their parents.
- Adults are most likely to be stressed out by work.
- Teens are more likely to feel stressed out in the early evening, and they experience more cognitive impairment under stress than do adults.
- Adults are most stressed out in the morning.
"We expect diurnal patterns of cortisol release to differ between adults and adolescents and that this distinction will correlate with levels of stress," said Dr. Galvan. "Previous work has shown that under identical stress conditions, teens show greater cortisol release than adults."
Posted By: Adolescent Substance Abuse