Wanting to matter and learning to care: A neurodevelopmental window of opportunity for (Pro) social learning?

Bibliographic Details
Title: Wanting to matter and learning to care: A neurodevelopmental window of opportunity for (Pro) social learning?
Authors: Ronald E. Dahl, Emma Armstrong-Carter, Wouter van den Bos
Source: Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, Vol 69, Iss , Pp 101430- (2024)
Publisher Information: Elsevier, 2024.
Publication Year: 2024
Collection: LCC:Neurophysiology and neuropsychology
Subject Terms: Adolescent development, Prosocial development, Mattering, Pubertal maturation, Hypothalamus, Salience network, Neurophysiology and neuropsychology, QP351-495
More Details: Wanting to matter—to feel socially recognized, appreciated, and capable of actions that benefit others—represents a fundamental motivation in human development. The motivational salience of mattering appears to increase in adolescence. Evidence suggests this is related to pubertal increases in the incentive salience for gaining social value and personal agency. This can provide a useful heuristic for understanding motivational proclivities (i.e. wanting to matter) that influence action-outcome learning as young adolescents are exploring and learning how to navigate increasingly complex social and relational environments. Adolescence also brings new capacities, motives, and opportunities for learning to care about and contribute to the benefit of others. Together, these create a window of opportunity: a sensitive period for learning to gain salient feelings of mattering through caring prosocial actions and valued societal contributions. Successfully discovering ways of mattering by doing things that matter to others may contribute to formative socio-emotional learning about self/other. Advances in understanding these social and relational learning processes and their neurodevelopmental underpinnings can inform strategies to improve developmental trajectories of social competence and wellbeing among adolescents growing up in a rapidly changing and increasingly techno-centric world.
Document Type: article
File Description: electronic resource
Language: English
ISSN: 1878-9293
Relation: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878929324000914; https://doaj.org/toc/1878-9293
DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2024.101430
Access URL: https://doaj.org/article/d94aa1424f5f400e8272e7e612ba0941
Accession Number: edsdoj.94aa1424f5f400e8272e7e612ba0941
Database: Directory of Open Access Journals
More Details
ISSN:18789293
DOI:10.1016/j.dcn.2024.101430
Published in:Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience
Language:English