have you ever tried to understand a
teenager it's exhausting right
you must be puzzled by the fact that
some teens do well in school lead clubs
and teens and volunteer in their
communities but they eat Tide Pods for
an online challenge speed and text while
driving binge drink and experiment with
illicit drugs how can so many teens be
so smart skilled and responsible and
careless risk takers at the same time
when I was 16
while frequently observing my peers in
person as well as on social media I
began to wonder why so many teens took
such crazy risks it seems like getting a
certificate from dare class in the fifth
grade can't stop them what was even more
alarming to me was that the more they
exposed themselves to these harmful
risks the easier it became for them to
continue taking risks
now this confused me but it also made me
incredibly curious so as someone with a
name that literally means to explore
knowledge I started searching for a
scientific explanation now it's no
secret that teens ages 13 to 18 are more
prone to risk-taking than children or
adults but what makes them so daring do
they suddenly become reckless or is this
just a natural phase that they're going
through
well neuroscientists have already found
evidence that the teen brain is still in
the process of maturation and that this
makes them exceptionally poor at
decision-making causing them to fall
prey to risky behaviors but in that case
if the maturing brain is to blame then
why are teens more vulnerable than
children even though their brains are
more developed than those of children
also not all teens in the world take
risks at the same level are there some
other underlying or unintentional causes
driving them too
taking well this is exactly what I
decided to research so I found in my
research on the basis of a psychological
process known as habituation or simply
what we refer to as getting used to it
habituation explains how our brains
adapt to some behaviors like lying with
repeated exposures and this concept
inspired me to design a project to
determine if the same principle could be
applied to the relentless rise of
risk-taking in teenagers so I predicted
that habituation to risk-taking may have
the potential to change the already
vulnerable teenage brain by blunting or
even eradicating the negative emotions
associated with risk like fear or guilt
I also thought because they would feel
less fearful and guilty this
desensitization would lead them to even
more risk-taking in short I wanted to
conduct a research study to answer one
big question why do teens keep making
outrageous choices that are harmful to
their health and well-being but there
was one big obstacle in my way
to investigate this problem I needed
teenagers to experiment on laboratories
and devices to measure their brain
activity and teachers or professors to
supervise me and guide me along the way
I needed resources but you see I
attended a high school in South Dakota
with limited opportunity for scientific
exploration my school had athletics
bands choirs debate and other clubs but
there are no stem programs or research
ventures and the notion of high
schoolers doing research or
participating in a science fair was
completely foreign simply put I didn't
exactly have the ingredients to make a
chef-worthy dish and these obstacles
were frustrated but I was also a
stubborn teenager and as the daughter of
Bangladeshi immigrants and one of just a
handful of Muslim students in my high
school in South Dakota
I often struggled to fit in and I wanted
to be someone with something to
contribute to society not just be deemed
boring Brown girl who was an anomaly in
my homogeneous hometown I hope that by
doing this research I could establish
this and how valuable scientific
exploration could be for kids like me
who didn't necessarily find their niche
elsewhere so with limited research
opportunities inventiveness allowed me
to overcome seemingly impossible
obstacles I became more creative in
working with a variety of methodologies
materials and subjects I transform into
my unassuming school library into a
laboratory and my peers into lab rats my
enthusiastic geography teacher who also
happens to be my school's football coach
ended up as my cheerleader becoming my
mentor to sign necessary paperwork and
when it became logistical 'i'm possibly
to use a laboratory
electroencephalography or EEG which are
those electro devices used to measure
emotional responses
I bought a portable EEG headset with my
own money instead of buying the new
iPhone X that a lot of kids my age were
saving up for so finally I started the
research with 86 students ages 13 to 18
from my high school using the computer
cubicles in my school library I had them
compete a computerized decision-making
simulation to measure their risk-taking
behaviors comparable to ones in the real
world like alcohol use drug use and
gambling wearing the EEG headset the
student has completed the task 12 times
over three days to mimic repeated risk
exposures a control panel on the EEG
headset measured their various emotional
responses like attention interest
excitement stration guilt stress levels
and relaxation
they also rated their emotions on
well-validated emotion measuring scales
this meant that I have measured the
process of habituation and its effects
on decision making and it took 29 days
to complete this research and with
months of frantically drafting proposals
meticulously computing data and a
caffeinated days at 2:00 a.m. I was able
to finalize my result
and the results showed that habituation
- risk-taking could actually change a
teens brain by altering their emotional
levels causing greater risk taking the
students emotions that were normally
associated with risks like fear stress
guilt and nervousness as well as
attention were high when they were first
exposed to the risk simulator this
curbed their temptations and enforced
self-control which prevented them from
taking more risks however the more
they're exposed to the risks through the
simulator
the less fearful guilty and stress they
became this caused the situation
influenced they were no longer able to
feel the brains natural fear and caution
instincts and also because they're
teenagers
and their brains are still
underdeveloped they became more
interested and excited in thrill-seeking
behaviors so what were the consequences
they lacked self-control for logical
decision-making took greater risks and
made more harmful choices so the
developing brain alone isn't to blame
the process of habituation also plays a
key role in risk-taking and risk
escalation although a teens willingness
to seek risk is largely a result of the
structural and functional changes
associated with their developing brains
the dangerous part that my research was
able to highlight was that a habituation
to risks can actually physically change
a team's brain and cause greater
risk-taking
so it's the combination of the immature
team brain and the impact of habituation
that is like a perfect storm to create
more damaging effects and this research
could help parents and the general
public understand that teens aren't just
willfully ignoring warnings or simply
defying parents by engaging an
increasingly more dangerous behavior the
biggest hurdle they're facing is their
habituation to risks all the physical or
detectable and emotional functional
changes that drive and control and
influence their over-the-top risk-taking
so yes we need policies that provide
safer environments and limit exposures
to high-risk
we also need policies that reflect this
insight these results are a wake-up call
for teens - it shows them that the
natural and necessary fear and guilt
that protect them from unsafe situations
actually become numb when they
repeatedly choose risky behaviors so
with this hope to share my findings with
fellow teenagers and scientists
I took my research to the Intel
International Science and Engineering
Fair or ICF a combination of over 1,800
students from 75 countries regions and
territories who showcased their
cutting-edge research and inventions
it's like the Olympics of science fair
there I was able to present my research
to experts in neuroscience and
psychology and varner valuable feedback
but perhaps the most memorable moment of
the week was when the booming speakers
suddenly uttered my name during the
award ceremony I was in such disbelief
that I questioned myself was this just
another la-la-land wonder like at the
Oscars luckily it wasn't um I really had
won first place in the category of
behavioral and social sciences
needless to say I was not only thrilled
to have this recognition but also the
whole experience of science fair that
validated my efforts keeps my curiosity
alive and strengthens my creativity
perseverance and imagination this still
image of me experimenting in my school
library may seem ordinary but to me it
represents a sort of inspiration it
reminds me that this process taught me
to take risks and I know that might
sound incredibly ironic but I took risks
realizing that unforeseen opportunities
often come from risk-taking not the
hazardous negative type that I studied
but the good ones the positive risks the
more risks I took the more capable I
felt of withstanding my unconventional
circumstances leading to more tolerance
resilience and patience for completing
my project and these lessons have led me
to new ideas like is the opposite of
negative risk-taking also true can
positive risk-taking escalate with
repeated exposures does positive action
build positive brain functioning I think
I just might have my next research idea
[Applause]
[Music]