As children, we see our parents above all as the embodiment of being an adult. They teach us what is right and what is wrong, are there for us without requiring us to be there for them in the same way, and they know exactly when to eat what or how long to sleep. Adults, so it sticks in our heads, know the rules, are independent and have a clear view. And most of the time they are between 30 and 40 years old, depending on how old our parents are when we start to think about them.
Childish imagination fits reality
According to Peter Jones, a neuroscientist and psychology professor at Cambridge University, a child's assessment of the truth happens to come relatively close. According to him, the transformation from child to adult is a process, a "gradual transition that spans three decades", as the Department of Psychology at Cambridge University quotes the professor on its website. So our child's imagination is obviously closer to a psychologically realistic adult age than, for example, our law – because according to that we are 18 years of age.
"Systems like the education, health or legal system make it easy with their definitions," Jones told "BBC". But that people switch to adult mode on a certain birthday – from a neurological and psychological point of view – complete nonsense. "There is no childhood and then being an adult," says Jones. You don't grow up in one step, but rather in one way. And it is longer for some, a little shorter for others – but completed after 18 or 21 years for very few.
At 18 in the middle of the maturity phase
According to the "BBC", different neurological examinations show that our brain, more precisely, our prefrontal cortex, when we are 18, is still in the middle of decisive development processes. That is why we are relatively susceptible to mental illness or self-esteem at this age as well as during puberty. At the earliest from the age of 25, but many only in their 30s, these processes are complete – and we become or feel more psychologically stable.
But does that mean that we have to rethink our legal age limits and definitions of legal age or can forget it altogether? Hardly, after all, being psychologically-neurological as an adult is not synonymous or the prerequisite for deciding on marriage or dealing responsibly with alcohol and cars. And if only people with a mature, stable personality were allowed to vote, not many votes would come together.
To organize and manage a society, it's okay to set certain fixed age limits, even though growing up is a lengthy, multi-stage process, as Jones and other neurologists say. Finally, we take some of these levels, for example, caring and considerate ability, earlier, others, such as self-confidence and determination, later. Well, and we never achieve some qualities that we have associated with being grown up as children – invulnerability and absolute freedom or independence. But maybe it is precisely this insight that somehow makes us grow up. Even if we don't feel the way we did in childhood.