How “likes” affect teenagers’ brains
The Economist:
FOR the first six months after teenagers in Colorado pass their driving test, the state bans them from carrying non-sibling teenage passengers unless someone over 21 is also in the car. It is not alone in this ageist approach. Fourteen other American states impose similar restrictions. The reason is that mountains of data show teenagers take risks more readily in the presence of their peers.
But, in today’s virtually enabled world, “presence” is a slippery concept. As a study published in Psychological Science by Lauren Sherman of the University of California, Los Angeles, and her colleagues shows, peers’ influence can travel even through something as apparently trivial as the “like” button in social media.
Read the whole story: The Economist
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