More Kids More Curiosity

In another post on this site, Kids and Curiosity, we explored the almost universal decline in native curiosity experienced by tweens and teens. In this post, we’ll develop these ideas more fully, but don’t worry, I’ll catch you up.

The human brain experiences five distinct eras as we age, and each is defined by changes in our neural architecture. That in turn influences how we process information, according to research recently published in Psychological Science by University of Chicago postdoctoral scholar Radhika Santhanagopalan, Ph.D.

Our brain’s connections wire themselves in pretty much the same way from birth to nine years of age. Then our neural architecture starts to organize differently as we enter adolescence, through age 32. At this point, the brain’s structural development appears to peak, according to Alexa Mousley, a neuroscientist at the University of Cambridge (UK)… not the University in Cambridge (US). The brain’s architecture stabilizes (compared with the previous phases) and intelligence plateaus.  

By the time of our first ‘molt’ (c. age 9), we have already begun to understand some things about information: (1) Knowledge is power. (2) Information is a tool. (3) Tools (e.g. information) can be weaponized. Middle school is an opportunity for us to deploy those weapons. The results are never pretty.

Sometime along the way, kids shed their luminous bodies and put on the shroud of adulthood. Sartre appropriately called it ‘the spirit of seriousness’. Typically, this happens at two major inflection points, one around the age of 10 and the second at 13. 

When children age from day care through kindergarten into first grade, they begin to understand their day to day experiences in terms of a ‘role’. How many parents have said, “Our job is to go to work and earn; your job is to go to school and learn?” And so learning becomes a programmed task, not a spontaneous response to one’s environment.

As we age further, our roles expand. We are players on a little league team, members of a girl scout troop, voices in a church choir. Later, we are cast members in our high school’s musical, we play right guard on the football team, and we write for the school newspaper. We have gained competence…but at the expense of curiosity.

But it doesn’t have to be this way! There’s nothing wrong with competence per se; in fact, it’s a good thing in itself and it is a prerequisite for survival in this world. The problem comes when we identify with the roles associated with those skills. We do not just ‘play’ football, we are football players; we do not just ‘write’, we are authors. 

In fact of course, we are none of those things. We’re not anything in this world. We are the world transcending itself. We are not just conscious, we are consciousness! We are the simultaneous awareness of our environment and of ourselves. We are not just recursive, we are recursion! We are the Universe looking at itself…and making adjustments.

We are right to be terrified. Our power is awesome…and we are totally alone with that power. We are desperate to fit in, to sand down all our rough edges, to cover-over any identifying marks. We yearn to be ‘just like everybody else’. 

We are like sleeper agents of a foreign power - not the USSR this time but God (or Gaia if you prefer). Our MO is to blend in, to attract no notice, to be as much like everyone else as possible. We tell ourselves, “That’s how you get ahead!” And we’re not entirely wrong.

But just like sleeper agents during the Cold War, we are almost certain to go native. We forget all about our secret mission and we focus on lowering our handicap (that’s golf talk, BTW). And when our ‘handler’ finally reaches out with orders from ‘on high’, we say, “We don’t know who you are; you must be mistaking us for someone else.” 

Sleeper Agent or Adolescent, we have become what we were put here to observe and correct; we have become part of the problem we were meant to solve. And, of course, we will eagerly perpetuate this cycle of doom with our own offspring. 

As we age, we continue to identify more closely with our roles. We become spouses, parents, employees, managers, entrepreneurs. Gradually, these are no longer things we do or roles we assume; they are who (or what) we have become. 

The pressure of living in our aspirational society is all consuming. We are 110% invested in making a living, raising a family, saving for retirement, and there’s no relief until we reach seniority (or senility, whichever comes first).

“Work/Life Balance” is a meme without meaning. Or, if it means anything, it refers to balancing different roles: e.g. cutting back on work so that we have time to coach our kids’ sports teams. There’s no question of making any room for us. Now none of these activities is bad per se; they are only ‘suboptimal’ when we become what we do.

Once we’re hooked, most of us will not have a realistic opportunity to pull back until we reach seniority. Then we yearn to rediscover ourselves, but we have no idea where to begin. Perhaps Social Security benefits need to include a free class called, Rediscovering You. 

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Grandma with Kids, Grandmother’s Fairy Tale (1882) by Konstantin Makovsky portrays a grandmother surrounded by children as she tells a story, creating a warm scene filled with curiosity and gentle attention. The richly detailed interior and traditional clothing emphasize themes of family heritage, shared memory, and the passing down of wisdom through generations.