by Callie Toal, 2022
I chose this topic because I am very interested in law and neuroscience, and I had no idea that they could be combined! After analyzing the new data, I believe that adolescents, no matter how horrible the crime, should not be tried as adults and should not be sentenced to harsh punishments like life with no parole or the death sentence.
What Role Should Age Play in Courts?
Modern adolescent neuropsychology has many controversial issues that are now being addressed due to advances in technology and science. One of these issues that had many theories surrounding it, but not much information to support these theories, is the role of age when convicting juvenile offenders as adults. In the article by Jones and Shen “Law and Neuroscience in the United States” nueroscience is being used more frequently as evidence within the courtroom. In 2010 the US Courts saw the first case using an fMRI as evidence. This same concept is now being applied to cases involving juvenile offenders. The court system has a long-standing history of trying juvenile offenders as adults for particularly heinous crimes such as murder or sexual assault. These juveniles are tried and convicted in the same way adults are, but neuroscience is now questioning if this is the appropriate way to handle these crimes. In order to understand this, perspective exploration of the typical developing adolescent brain needs to take place, which explains adolescent risk taking behavior, impulsivity, and high influence of peers. After examining the neuroscience behind their behavior it will be important to examine how the courts legally define an “adult” in order to make criminal convictions of juvenile offenders. Finally, I will explain how this evidence supports my opinion that juvenile offenders cannot be tried as adults due to their brain development, and the age of legal adulthood should be raised based on the evidence of these studies.
Examining the brain of an adolescent who is developing into an adult, three segments of brain structure and function help to explain their behavior: the limbic system, the prefrontal cortex, and neurotransmitters. According to the research done by Arain et al. in the “Maturation of the Adolescent Brian” the limbic system in the brain consists of the amygdala, hippocampus, and hypothalamus. These parts of the brain influence emotion and motivation in relation to survival, which is more simply described as the part of the brain that controls the fight or flight response. Within the limbic system there is control of both negative feelings such as fear or anger; and positive feelings such as eating or sex. This part of the brain also plays a large role in memory storage directly related to memories with strong emotions tied to them. When looking at the adolescent brain it is clear that they utilize the limbic system when deciphering others emotions as well as during interactions with others. They also use this part of their brain more frequently than adults when it comes to decision-making. During adolescence there is also significant change in the prefrontal cortex as explained by Steinberg in his article “Commentary: A Behavioral Scientist Looking at the Science of Adolescent Brain Development.”. The prefrontal cortex is located in the front of the brain and controls primary executive functions. Executive functions are higher-level cognitive processes such as decision-making, problem solving, and impulse control. During adolescence there is a large shift in the prefrontal cortex from primarily grey matter to white matter. This large shift within the prefrontal cortex allows for more connectivity between this part of the brain and other parts of the brain such as the limbic system, but the lack of development in this area leads to more risk taking behavior, impulsivity, and lack of self-regulation. Finally, the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin are affected during adolescent brain development. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter involved in the sensations of pleasure and pain. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter involved in mood alterations, anxiety, impulse control, and arousal. During adolescence levels of dopamine and serotonin decrease greatly leading to mood swings, a lack of ability to regulate emotions, and a lack of impulse control.
When taking into account these three parts of the brain most affected during adolescence as compared to adults there is a clear understanding of the type of behavior to be seen during adolescence. The first behavior most commonly seen during adolescence is risk-taking behavior. Due to lack of development in the prefrontal cortex the risk taking behavior is extremely escalated. This lack of development in the prefrontal cortex is only enhanced by the decrease in serotonin and dopamine. The risk taking behavior within adolescents serves both a positive and negative purpose. Adolescent risk taking allows them to put themselves in uncomfortable situations that can lead to new skills and prepare them for the challenges that await them in their future. This explains why teens take risks, but some of the risks that they take can affect their life more deeply. Risk taking behavior becomes especially dangerous for adolescents because they lack the executive functioning skills in the prefrontal cortex to assess how risky a situation actually is. As explained in an article written by Steinberg “Risk Taking in Adolescence” it is clear that even when teens are able to identify that they are in a situation that could cause risk, the communication between the limbic system and prefrontal cortex leads to a desire to meet the limbic systems need for pleasure negating the risk factors. The same connection between the prefrontal cortex and limbic system can also account for adolescents need for peer influence involved during risk taking behavior. In his article “A Behavioral Scientists Looks at the Science of Adolescent Brain Development” Steinberg explains that when looking at brain images adolescents the socio-emotional reward regions of the brain are activated more strongly when making risky decisions in front of their peers rather than alone. This is a direct connection to the emotional arousal and approval that adolescents get from their friends. Within the limbic system that adolescents utilize more frequently there is a need for pleasure leading to this approval from their friends.
To date these neuropsychological arguments are beginning to be used more frequently in the court system. In the article “Neuroscience and Juvenile Justice” by Aronson the use of this neuroscience is explored. In the case Roper v. Simmons is Washington, D.C. the legal defense argued that the death penalty for the 17 year old being tried for murder was cruel and unusual punishment based on the evidence that adolescents are not fully in control of their behavior at this age due to the brain structure still being developed. They were attempting to differentiate between adults and adolescents by using neuropsychological evidence. This court case highlights another important issue, which is when do adolescent’s transition to adulthood. Several articles mentioned previously in this paper argue that the brain is still developing till age 25 leading to risk taking behavior and lack of impulse control similar to a 15 year old. According to research done by Cohen et al. in their article “When is an Adolescent an Adult? Assessing Cognitive Control in Emotional and Nonemotional Contexts” in brain imaging as well as brain function scans it is evident that 18-21 year olds showed similar emotional arousal to those within their early adolescence. Evidence such as this supports the increase in age of adolescence as neurochemically and structurally these “adults” show many similarities to their early adolescent counterparts. Casey et al. is leading a study to hone in on the adolescent mind, asking at what age do people gain the ability to control themselves in emotionally charged situations? To answer this question they placed 13 to 25 year olds into a brain scanner while asking them to do a task that required restraint. Specifically, they had to press a button if they saw a bored or scared face but they were told not to press the button if they saw a happy face. The twist was that subjects performed the task under three conditions: positive arousal, being told that they could be rewarded up to $100, negative arousal, being told that there could be a loud noise, and no arousal, where they were told nothing. The idea behind this experiment was that the first two conditions would create a sustained period of heightened emotion. This was inspired by the circumstances of criminal behavior because many crimes committed by adolescents are emotionally or socially charged situations. The key question being why, in the heat of the moment, under threat, do they pull the trigger, even when they know better? The results of her experiment involving negative stimulus was that 18 to 21 year old were less able to restrain themselves from pushing the button when there was threat of a loud noise than 22 to 25 year olds. However, this diminished cognitive control was no observed under positive or neutral conditions. Interestingly enough, under threatening conditions, the 18 to 21 year olds weren’t much better than teenagers. Moreover, the brain scanners revealed that areas in the prefrontal cortex that regulate emotion showed reduced activity, while areas linked to emotional centers were in high gear. What I took from this was that adolescents act on their emotions and in the heat of the moment because their prefrontal cortex is not developed enough to allow them to actually think through their decisions since their emotions are overpowering it. This explains why adolescents are more involved in risky behavior and are in jail.
In order to get a full picture of the controversial topic of using neuroscience in law to differentiate adolescents from adults and increase the age of adulthood, it is important to have an understanding of the juvenile offenders this work is affecting. In an article written by Jerry Fagnan in The American Prospect there is exploration of this juvenile justice system and how “maturity” has been decided historically. This ability to try adolescents as adults became popularized in the 1970’s when there was a sharp increase in juvenile offenders. At that point in time the adolescent’s ability to be tried as an adult was made by the judge on a case-by-case basis with recommendation from social workers and previous offender history taken into account. This was the system that was deemed most appropriate, but due to new technological advances we are now able to see that there is a large difference in the brain chemistry and structure of a juvenile offender versus an adult offender. Essentially it only makes sense that we would not try juvenile offenders as adults because there is scientific evidence that proves they do not have the impulse control, executive functioning, or ability to make rational decisions that adults do. Furthermore, young adults who, based on scientific evidence, share a lot of the executive functioning of their early adolescents counterparts are also being tried based on their adult age. In his article “Neuroscience Is Changing the Debate Over What Role Age Should Play in the Courts” Tim Requarth tells the story of Antonio House, a young man who turned 19 two months before his conviction of two counts of first degree murder. Antonio, a teenage drug dealer for the gang unknown Vice Lords, was asked to be a lookout while his boss murdered members of their rival gang. He received the same punishment as his boss who actually organized and completed the murders. Fortunately, Antonio was able to utilize the same reasoning that is used for juveniles in the Supreme Court of Law for the first time in American Law. This result was thanks to use of the research that shows the adolescent brain is still developing into mid twenties. These two articles show the climate of the United States Juvenile Justice and Young Adult Justice system is changing, which is thanks to the neuroscience work being done by researchers around the country. House’s case is the first to successfully apply the Supreme Court’s reasoning about adolescents who committed a crime after age 18.
Based on all of this information, I agree with the fact that juvenile offenders should not be tried as adults due to their brain development. However, in the case of young adults between the ages of 18 to 25, is a bit of a gray area so more research needs to be done to support that they have similar brain chemistry to young adolescents. Additionally, I think that the age that we classify legal adulthood should be raised because we can clearly see that people, even around the age of 24 or 25, have a more similar brain structure to adolescents than to adults. Convicted juveniles are not their fully developed selves yet and are clearly not capable of making the right choices all of the time due to the fact that their limbic system, the prefrontal cortex, which is involved in higher-level cognitive processes like decision-making, problem solving, and impulse control is not fully formed yet, so there is not as much connectivity between these parts of the brain which causes risky behavior and low impulse control. Additionally, adolescents levels of dopamine and serotonin are out of sync so they have difficulty regulating their emotions and have low impulse control, which is why they engage in risky behavior. Brain areas involved in reasoning and self control, such as the prefrontal cortex, are not fully developed until the mid 20s, a far later age than previously thought. Yet, brain areas involved in emotions such as desire, and fear are fully developed by age 17. In the article “Neuroscience is Changing the Debate Over What Role Age Should Play in the Courts” Casey et. al says that “this pattern of brain development creates a perfect storm for crime: Around the ages of 18 to 21, people have the capacity for adult emotions yet a teenagers ability to control them.” On a similar but different note, raising the adult age makes perfect sense because, as Elizabeth Scott, a professor of law at Columbia University, put it best “People are not magically different on their 18th birthday. Their brains are still maturing, and the criminal justice system should find a way to take that into account.” In the case of Antonio House, I agree that they should utilize the same reasoning they use for juveniles in court regarding the new neuroscience data. This case will be a turning point in neuroscience as well as in American law. However, we have to be very careful that this new neuroscience evidence does not become the basis for an excuse of criminal behavior in adolescents. Particularly, researcher Steinberg says that “...The question is how culpable are they, and how do we punish them?” It is easy to forget that the legal definition of an adult is a cultural construct pieced together years ago, around the time when juvenile courts were first established so this cutoff has no real empirical basis. This neuroscience merely confirms what is already known: modern adolesce seems to be prolonged, with people completing school, establishing financial independence, and starting families at a much later age, so it only makes sense that criminals should go to adult prison at a later age as well.
Instead of punishing we should be helping these troubled adolescents; youth at this point in their lives are so impressionable. Due to the plasticity and executive functioning abilities in the brain, if we step in the first time juvenile offenders are convicted, we can rehabilitate rather than punish. As a result, legal experts and policy makers are beginning to reconsider how the criminal justice system treats this age range. For example, Governor Dannel Malloy of Connecticut, proposed raising the juvenile age to 20 and instituting alternative ways to deal with people up to age 25, such as keeping convictions for less serious crimes confidential and establishing a special young-offender prison whose primary focus is reform and reintegration of juvenile offenders. There are already some places in the US putting some of these alternatives into place. In particular, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office, is starting a separate court system for ages 16 to 24. This court, beginning with low level offenses, has a dedicated judge, defense staff, prosecutors and social workers. Similarly, the San Francisco DA launched a similar program but focused more on felonies, including violent crimes. Both programs are working on an approach that takes developmental factors into account. On a different note, young offenders are entering an adult system, are often faced with harsh and protective and disciplinary measures like solitary confinement. Solitary confinement is often used to punish adolescents for misbehavior, to isolate them if dangerous, to separate adolescents vulnerable to abuse from others, and for medical reasons like suicidal ideation. However, research shows that solitary confinement can cause serious psychological and developmental harm to children, and can have a detrimental effect on their ability to rehabilitate. Adolescents kept in isolation lose touch with reality, and can develop identity disorders. Clearly, this punishment is more detrimental to adolescents than actually helping them. Instead, the Supreme Court emphasized the importance of treating young adolescents in the criminal justice system with special constitutional protections regarding punishment, and since solitary confinement is physically and mentally harmful to adolescents, many are calling for reform. Suggestions include increasing the number of trained supervised staff in facilities, like social workers and other mental health professionals. Additionally, providing adolescents with programs and activities in groups may also help development and rehabilitation. Research has also emphasized rewarding positive behaviour instead of punishing bad ones because adolescents crave rewards. Research has also linked the role of education to improved behavior and lower rates of delinquency among incarcerated youths. Education may improve rehabilitation efforts to assist youth in productive re entry into the community. All in all, because adolescents wrongdoings are often the product of immaturity, adolescent criminals may have a greater potential to reform due to brain's plasticity in this stage of life.
Works Cited:
Arain, M., Haque, M., Johal, L., Mathur, P., Nel, W., Rais, A., Sandhu, R., and Sharma, S. (2013).Maturation of the adolescent brain. Neuropsychiatric Dis Treatment, 9, 449-461.
Aronson, J. (2009). Neuroscience and Juvenile Justice. Akron Law Review, 42 (3): 917 – 930.
Cohen, AO.,Breiner, K., Steinberg, L., Bonnie, RJ., Scott, ES., Taylor-Thompson, KA., Rudolph, MD., Chein, J., Richeson, JA., Heller, AS., Silverman, MR., Dellarco, DV., Fair DA.,Galván, A., and Casey, BJ. (2016). When Is an Adolescent an Adult? Assessing Cognitive Control in Emotional and Nonemotional Contexts. Psychological Science, 27 (4): 549 – 562. DOI: 10.1177/0956797615627625.
Fagnan, J. (2005).Adolescents, Maturity, And The Law.The American Prospect. Retrieved from https://prospect.org/article/adolescents-maturity-and-law
Lawrence, S. (2007). Risk Taking in Adolescence: New Perspectives From Brain and Behavioral Science. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 16 (2),55-59.
Lawrence, S. (2010). Commentary: A Behavioral Scientist Looks at the Science of Adolescent Brain Development. Brain Cognition, 72 (1), 160-164. doi: 10.1016/j.bandc.2009.11.003.
Pope, K., Luna, B., Thomas, C. (2012). Developmental Neuroscience and the Courts: How Science Is Influencing the Disposition of Juvenile Offenders. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 51(4): 341- 342. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2012.01.003
Requarth, T. (2016). Neuroscience Is Changing the Debate Over What Role Age Should Play in the Courts. Newsweek Magazine.Retrieved from https://www.newsweek.com/2016/04/29/young-brains-neuroscience-juvenile-inmates- criminal-justice-449000.html
Muller , Robert T. “Rehabilitation Benefits Young Offenders.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 17 Sept. 2015, www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/talking-about-trauma/201509/rehabilitation-benefits-young-offenders.
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