"Unlocking the Minds of Adolescents: When Do They Start Thinking Like Adults?"

A new "big data" study has revealed when adolescents begin to think like adults. The study analyzed the performance of nearly 10,800 individuals aged between 8 and 35 years on 23 different measures of executive function. The results showed that executive function improves with age, with the biggest improvements occurring between 10-15 years and smaller improvements from 15-18 years. Performance on all measures stabilized to adult levels between 18 and 20 years of age. The findings confirm that adolescence is a distinct transitional phase during which goal-directed executive functioning reaches maturity. However, brain maturation continues into the third decade of life, suggesting that cognitive performance alone may not fully determine when adolescents reach adulthood.