Laurence Steinberg, Ph.D.

 

Current Projects:

My research focuses on brain and behavioral development during adolescence.  In the past, I have studied parent-adolescent relations, psychosocial maturity, school performance, after-school employment, developmental psychopathology, and juvenile justice. My current projects fall into four broad categories:

Adolescent Decision-Making

My work on adolescent decision-making examines the ways in which core psychological processes that affect judgment, decision-making, and risk-taking develop between the years of 10 and 30. I am especially interested in the implications of this research for legal and social policies affecting teenagers and young adults, particularly in the context of criminal law.

            Age Differences in Decision-Making Across Cultures. In collaboration with Jennifer Lansford and Ken Dodge, at Duke University, and an international team of investigators, I am studying whether the pattern of development observed in the core components of decision-making identified in our studies of Americans are seen in other countries as well. We are currently in the field collecting data from samples of 10- to 30-year-olds in China, Colombia, Cyprus, India, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, and the United States (400 persons in each locale). Data collection will be complete sometime this year. The project is funded by the Jacobs Foundation.

            Parenting Across Cultures. In many of the same countries in which we are studying age differences in decision-making, the same team of researchers is continuing a longitudinal study of children and their parents, begun when the children were 8 years old, to examine how various disciplinary practices affect children’s development, risky behavior, aggression, and decision-making. We have completed the collection of data up through age 10 and are currently in the field collecting the next wave. We have funding from NICHD to continue this research through age 17.

            Adolescent Development and Criminal Culpability. As part of a series of projects overseen by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Law and Neuroscience, I am collaborating with a team of neuroscientists (B.J. Casey, Adriana Galvan, Jason Chein, Damien Fair) and legal scholars (Richard Bonnie and Elizabeth Scott) to examine changes in neural processes and behaviors between the ages of 8 and 24 that have implications for how we judge juvenile offenders’ criminal culpability. Data will be collected in Los Angeles and New York. We will be using the decision-making battery used in the cross-national study and are currently pilot testing tasks to be used in the fMRI scanner.  This project is funded by the MacArthur Foundation.

            Genetic Influences on Adolescent Decision-Making and Alcohol Use. In a collaboration with Paige Harden, at the University of Texas, we are about to begin a study of adolescent twins in order to examine the genetic and environmental contributors to risk-taking and alcohol use.  We will be using much of the test battery that is being used in the cross-national study of decision-making. This project was recent approved for funding by NIAAA and will be going into the field in 2012.

Neural and Behavioral Correlates of Peer Influences on Adolescent Behavior

My work on the neural and behavioral correlates of peer influences on adolescent behavior is grounded in the observation that, in the real world as well as the experimental laboratory, adolescents, but not adults, take more risks in the presence of their peers than they do when they are alone. We have been using fMRI as well as behavioral methods to better understand why this is true. Some of our work involves the development and validation of new tasks and techniques to measure risk-taking, reward-seeking, response inhibition, and peer influence.

            Peer Influences on Adolescent Risk-Taking. At our lab at Temple University, Jason Chein and I are studying the neural and behavioral factors that account for this.  In an study for which data collection is nearly complete, we have been imaging adolescents’ and adults’ brain activity while they are performing various types of decision-making tasks either with or without being observed by their peers. This research has been funded by NIDA.  We are currently seeking additional funding to determine whether the peer effect is also a factor in adolescent girls’ decisions to take risks when in the presence of their boyfriends.

            The Joint Impact of Alcohol and Peer Influence on Adolescent Risk-Taking. In this project, which is also based at Temple, Jason Chein, Mike McCloskey, and I are studying whether consuming alcohol exacerbates the peer effect on risk taking and, if so, what the underlying neural processes might be.  Because we are actually having participants drink alcohol in this study, our participants are all 21 or older. This research is just beginning, and is funded by NIAAA.

            The Impact of Cognitive Control Training on Susceptibility to the Peer Effect.  A third study of the neural underpinnings of the peer effect in our lab at Temple is asking whether a byproduct of strengthening adolescents’ ability to exercise self-control through a working memory training program is greater resistance to the peer effect on risk-taking and, if so, what the underlying neural mechanisms are.  This study has been approved for funding by NIDA.

            “Peer” Influences on Alcohol Consumption in Mice. In a collaboration with behavioral neuroscientists Thomas Gould and Sheree Logue, we are examining whether the peer effect we have observed in human adolescents is seen in “adolescent” mice as well, by studying whether mice consume more alcohol in the presence of mice they have been reared with than when they are alone, and whether this effect is stronger among mice who have recently gone through puberty than mice who are fully mature. This is a pilot project funded by Temple University.

Patterns of Development Among Juvenile Offenders

My work on patterns of development among juvenile offenders examines the factors that affect the development, behavior, and mental health of adolescents who have had contact with the justice system, and whether certain types of justice system responses are more likely to produce beneficial results than others.

            Crossroads: Formal vs. Informal Processing in the Juvenile Justice System. In a collaboration with Elizabeth Cauffman, at the University of California, Irvine and Paul Frick, at the University of New Orleans, we are studying how diversion from formal processing by the justice system affects the subsequent behavior and development of first-time juvenile offenders. We are following samples of offenders for three years in Philadelphia, Santa Ana, and New Orleans (Jefferson Parish) who have committed similar offenses, but who have either been formally processed in court or diverted into a more informal arrangement, to study whether diversion leads to fewer disruptions in development and less recidivism. This project is funded by the MacArthur Foundation and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

            Pathways from Desistance. In a collaboration with a large team of researchers assembled by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice, we have studied a large sample of serious juvenile offenders convicted of felony crimes in Philadelphia and Phoenix over a seven-year period, to better understand the factors that influence some offenders to continue committing crime into adulthood and others to desist. We completed data collection several years ago but continue to analyze this unique and rich data set.

The Positive Psychology of Adolescence

I have recently become interested in the links between positive psychological health in adolescence and physical health, both during adolescence and into adulthood.  Positive psychological health is not simply the absence of psychological problems – it is defined by better-than-average functioning, or “flourishing.” This work is being done in collaboration with researchers led by Martin Seligman at the Center for Positive Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

            EPOCH. Based on our theoretical model of positive adolescent functioning, our group has recently developed a self-report measure that assesses the five components of positive well-being in adolescence that we believe are important: Engagement, Perseverance, Optimism, Connectedness, and Happiness (EPOCH).  We are currently in the process of validating and refining the measure in samples of adolescents in Australia and the United States.

            Using Existing Data Sets to Study Positive Adolescent Functioning. Although the study of positive adolescent psychology is just beginning, there are many existing data sets that contain measures of psychological well-being and physical health in adolescence and adulthood, but which have never been used to examine their connection. A team of researchers at the University of Pennsylvania has been searching through archives of previously conducted longitudinal studies to determine whether it is possible to use these data sets to test hypotheses about the health effects of positive adolescent well-being. We have successfully reanalyzed data from two such studies.

            The Importance of Grit. One component of our EPOCH model is perseverance, which is similar to the construct of “grit” that University of Pennsylvania psychologist Angela Duckworth has been studying.  In a collaboration with Angela, we have developed a new measure of grit and are working with a number of organizations in the worlds of business, education, and professional athletics to see whether the measure can predict performance above and beyond the predictions derived from more traditional and widely-used measures.