One thing everyone reading this blog should know is I am in love with the city of the Boston. My goal for the future is to work in one of the hospitals in Boston, especially Massachusetts General Hospital due to its reputation of being the number one hospital in the world for psychiatry. So, if anyone comes across any resources from the Boston area hospitals about how alcohol affects the teenage brain, it would be greatly apprieciated if youcould share that information with me. Also, if you know any contacts from the Boston area that could help me with this project, it wold be great if you could give me some information on them so I can contact them to get some helpful insight on this project. I really want to make a difference in the lives of teenagers and hopefully through this project I can start to do so.
One possible topic for my research project is the effects of alcohol on neurodevelopment (or the teenage brain) in adolescence. This research topic would allow me to be involved in a division of psychiatry that I could potentially be involved with later on in life. If I do choose to research this topic I will be using resources from the top psychiatry and addiction hospitals on the east coast such as Massachusetts General Hospital, Duke Medical Center, Boston Children's Hospital, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, and Fletcher Allen Medical Center and other organizations such as NCANDA( the national consortium on alcohol and neurodevelopment in adolescence.) Surveys are starting to show that 72% of high school seniors have used alcohol in their life. Alcohol is very harmful to the developing adolescent brain because it effects teens' cognitive abilities, brain development, and teenage drinking has been proven to create anatomical abnormalities in teenage brains with problematic alcohol use. Alcoholism in teens is a growing and pressing problem that sometimes falls under the radar, and through this project I hope to gain more information to help the problem now and in the future.
Survey facts: NCANDA. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2014. <http://ncanda.org/> The picture above depicts how alcohol affects the anatomical structures of the brain and the effects on the mental capacity of someone who is a heavy drinker during adolescence. Even though the heavy drinker was sober in this trial, one can see that there is limited memory activity in the male that is a heavy drinker versus the male who does not drink. The cerebrum in the brain is responsible for short and long term memory and alcohol has clearly affected the cerebrum in the heavy drinker and that is why he has little to no memory or brain activity during the trial. Our brains are our control centers, it controls all of our body systems such as our muscular, respiratory, and our digestive system, and it functions as our control center because of chemical and electrical signals that are transmitted from cell to cell. Electrical signals serve as communicators within the cells but the chemical signals serve as communicators between the different cells, and this chemical signals are called neurotransmitters. The gap that allows the neurotransmitters to travel from cell to cell is called the synapse and when the neurotransmitters travel they each bind to a protein receptor specific to the neurotransmitter. When the neurotransmitter and receptor protein bind together the receiving cell's behavior changes electrically and chemically causing the cell to either to perform an action or prohibit that action from happening and when alcohol reaches the synapse, the normal connection between neurotransmitters and receptor cells are disrupted. So they neurotransmitters in a teenager's cerebrum are affected by alcohol because they are not allowed to travel to other cells and communicate and work together to provide the person with any memory.
In any person's brain, alcohol kills brain cells that do not regenerate, but since teenage brains have not developed until the age of twenty five. Many important neurotransmitters and brain cells are killed along with the brain and central nervous system being depressed. The brain tissue contracts when it comes in contact with alcohol and it disrupts the communication between nerve cells by acting like a receptor so the neurotransmitter is not binding to a receptor that would allow it to have memory. If a neurotransmitter binds to a neuron and it sparks a positive reaction it is called an excitatory reaction and when the neurotransmitter binds with a neuron and it sparks a negative reaction it is called it an inhibitory reaction. Alcohol suppresses the excitatory nerve pathway but increases inhibitory nerve pathways which causes people to be sluggish. Alcohol affects the neurotransmitter GABA and glutamine which increases the amount of sluggishness even more. Since teenage brains are not fully developed, the effect of alcohol on the central nervous system is multiplied because the development of the brain is damaged more than a developed brain. NL Bio. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2014. <http://nlbio.wikispaces.com/ HOW+ALCOHOL+AFFECTS+THE+BRAIN>. Preventing Substance Abuse Together Chesterfield Safe. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2014. <http://chesterfieldsafe.org/ForParents/UnderageDrinking.aspx>. What my project is about: another possible research topic: Topic # 1: Alcoholism in Adults9/20/2014 A possible research topic I am interested in pursuing for my STEM seminar is alcoholism in adults. This research topic would allow me to focus on psychiatry and addiction medicine but the topic of alcoholism in the elderly and older adults would allow me to broaden my horizon in the effects of alcohol on the body in different age groups. I want to focus on alcoholism and how it affects older adults and their bodies. Alcoholism is defined as an addiction to the consumption of alcoholic liquor or the mental illness and compulsive behavior resulting from alcohol dependency. In older adults/ aging adults bodies, the tolerance for alcohol decreases and older people generally experience the effects of alcohol more quickly which puts them at risk for falls, car accidents, and other injuries that result form drinking. The elderly and older aged men and women are considered to be alcoholics if they have three or more drinks a day or seven drinks a week. Over time, drinking too much in the elderly or older aged people changes the normal balance of chemicals and nerve tracks in your brain associated with judgement and control over your behavior . Alcoholism is typically thought of have to have affected middle aged adult but people fail to recognize how it affects the elderly and their aged bodies and brains. Alcoholism in adults has been proven to cause a link in alcoholism in the parent's children. Alcohol dependence/ abuse in parents has been shown to cause alcohol abuse in their children during their teenage years. Degree of exposure to alcohol in your family environment was shown to to be highly related to later life alcohol use, alcoholism, time in jail, and sociopathy. We need to cure and prevent alcoholism in all age so we can reduce its domino effect on America's future. I hope that through this project people begin to realize that no matter how old or young someone is , alcohol can take over someone;s life at any time. Health care professionals are starting to research and perform clinical trials to try and cure and prevent alcoholism, and I hope to be part of that some day.
The British Journal of Psychiatry. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Sept. 2014. <http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/149/5/584.short>. Hi, my name is Mia Steupert, and I am a senior at Rutland High School. I am participating in Rutland High School's STEM concentration research project/seminar. This blog will serve as a place for anyone to view my blog posts and keep up to date on my progress for this research project. Enjoy and feel free to comment on the posts with information regarding my topic or any information on the topic, thank you!
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