(The video password can be found in the 2013 April Parent Newsletter under “Parent News”.)

On February 13, Dr. Marisa Silveri, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Director of Neurodevelopmental Laboratory on Addictions and Mental Health, Brain Imaging Center, McLean Hospital and the FCD, Freedom from Chemical Dependency spoke about the adolescent brain.

Dr. Silveri has been studying the adolescent brain for the past 15 years and currently uses the MRI to study teen brain development with a focus on identifying behavioral features of adolescence, including increased risk taking, poor decision-making, impulsivity and reducted frontal lobe function, which overlap with features observed in substance abuse and psychiatric illness. Dr. Silveri uses MRI to characterize healthy adolescent brain development, as well as neurobiological effects of early drug and alcohol use, in an effort to identify risk factors for later substance abuse and dependence, as well as factors that may contribute to the onset of psychiatric illness.

You can watch the video from the Parent Association assembly above.