David Yeager argues against the "neurobiological incompetence model" of adolescent development, which suggests that adolescents lack the cognitive maturity for advanced functions due to an immature prefrontal cortex. This belief often leads adults to underestimate young people's potential and capabilities. Yeager emphasizes the importance of maintaining high expectations while providing appropriate support to help youth thrive. He also critiques how social media perpetuates misleading narratives about mental health conditions, which further influences parental perceptions and responses to their children's behaviors.
Yeager's research points us in another direction. He argues that the best way to motivate young people is to have high expectations of them, while simultaneously providing them with necessary scaffolding to maximize the probability of their success.
While there is some truth to this, adults can fall into the trap of not supporting youth in meeting high standards because we believe they are not neurodevelopmentally capable of meeting those standards which is often not the case.
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