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But no one seems to be interested in looking at that. That would help us determine whether it’s worth going down this biological rabbit hole. It would be good for researchers to ask about what puberty looks and sounds like in other countries and cultures and to see if boys go quiet there. Since we know quiet correlates strongly with puberty for so many boys, I think there has to be a biological basis. I think that’s because it’s a lot more interesting or grabs more headlines to be able to tie testosterone to aggression or rage than to tie it to not talking. But there’s no data I mean, there are no studies looking at this. I don’t even know how long I spent just digging through data, trying to find any studies that looked at a biological explanation. JS: Why do you think boys become so much less communicative in their teen years?ĬN: Well, that’s the million-dollar question. Frankly, it’s hard to be in between extremes, too but I think being on the extremes is something that requires particular sensitivity from parents and from society. Late bloomers don’t have these signs, and that’s hard. That has its own set of repercussions and challenges, right? Because by 14, most of the boys around them are growing, their shoulders are widening, their muscle mass is increasing, and their voices are starting to drop-all of these externalizing signs of entering manhood. Then there’s the opposite extreme: the late-blooming boy who has not started to have testicular growth by the age of 14. You can have a whole constellation of things happening, essentially invisible to everyone around them, and this can be really confusing to boys. Because most boys become more private, and parents don’t know what to look for (the changes can be really subtle at first, because only the testicles change in early puberty, and most parents don’t see this growth), parents have no idea their sons are beginning puberty. It can be hard for boys who are getting in trouble for their behavior or feeling low self-esteem, self-doubt, or worry and don’t know what’s going on.

You’re starting to feel these feelings or show certain behaviors but likely no one is connecting the dots to early puberty. So, say you’re a nine- or ten-year-old boy.

It’s just not always called out that way.

There are lots of studies about how testosterone impacts aggression and rage, and we know that testosterone causes mood swings in boys much in the same way that estrogen causes them in girls. JS: Does entering early puberty have effects on boys’ well-being?ĬN: Absolutely! When you enter puberty, the testosterone manufactured by the testicles circulates around the body, but also through the brain, impacting the wiring of the brain and neurodevelopment. Even though the headlines in the mainstream media have all been about girls and early puberty, it’s been happening for boys, too. But a secret that the scientific community has known for a long time that isn’t widely known is that testosterone levels are starting to rise and testicles are starting to grow at increasingly young ages for boys, which means that boys are entering puberty younger. What most surprised you when looking at the research on testosterone?ĬN: As a pediatrician, I’ve known for a long time what testosterone does in the body so that wasn’t particularly new to me. JS: In your book, you offer a kind of primer about testosterone and its role in development.

#TEENAGE BOY MODELS HOW TO#

And most boys don’t know how to talk about it or how to identify what they feel about it. Boys have a different beauty standard than girls, but most people don’t talk to boys about it.

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We are really good at identifying body image pressures placed upon girls, which are magnified across social media, but we don’t do a great job of recognizing that the exact same drivers are in place for our boys. There are also things that are driven by selfies and social media-like body image issues. How do we talk to kids about consent when we haven’t talked to them about any of this other stuff? If you haven’t had conversations around general consent for the years leading up to when kids become sexually active, you’re facing a steep climb. And, with the #MeToo movement, issues around consent have come to the forefront. That’s very different than it was when we were growing up. Cara Natterson: Some of them revolve around sex: the evolution of online pornography, the easy access to porn and the messages that porn sends, in terms of teaching kids what sex might look like-this is arguably very different than what most parents hope for for their children.

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