Teenage brains not ready to vote

Dear Editor:

Why doesn’t it surprise me that some idealistic Victoria councillors are supporting the concept of giving the vote to 16-yearolds?

This is so blatantly shallow that it might be described as laughable. This is a political ploy designed to garner votes from an easily susceptible demographic of the population, under the guise of getting this group more involved in the political process.

It is not only teenage hormones that get in the way of a rational decision-making process during adolescence, but perhaps more important is that the prefrontal cortex of the brain, where all one’s rational decisions are made, is not developed in juveniles.

This area of the brain plays a major role in weighing choices, controlling impulses and making sound judgments.

In adults, this part of the brain is fully developed, and even then some might argue that it doesn’t stop them from making inappropriate choices. The teenage brain makes decisions based on emotional impulses rather than making choices by using the more sensible prefrontal cortex of the brain in coming to well-thought-out and considered decisions.Winston Churchill once said if you are not a socialist by the time you are 20, you have no heart; if you are not a conservative by the time you are 40, you have no brain. Bev Highton Oak Bay