Brain Development During Childhood and Adolescence (Fact Sheet)
In recent years, powerful new imaging technologies and other
approaches have allowed scientists to track the development of
the brain during childhood. These studies offer a way to
understand how the intellectual abilities and behavioral
maturity of children at various ages are rooted in the
developing brain. Studies of the developing brain also offer the
best possibility for understanding the origins of mental
illnesses. Research suggests that vulnerability to mental
illness—and resilience—is rooted in development. Both risk and
resilience are shaped by genes and environment interacting
together, through childhood and adolescence. Research can show
how. - Thirty years ago, it was thought that children did not
experience mood disorders like depression. - In the 1980s and
1990s, national surveys revealed that many adults with mental
illness recall having had their first symptoms in youth.
Subsequent work confirmed that early signs of psychiatric d