Why Did We Include Connection With Our App Model?
Connection is a core component of adolescent mental health. Without supportive relationships, tweens and teens are far more likely to experience depression and anxiety and to be at risk for self-harm. Positive relationships with family, friends and others build tweens’ and teens’ self-esteem, increase their resilience, lower their risk of anxiety and depression, and even […]
Why Confidence is so Important for Teens
Here’s a cool, little-known fact about the word confidence: it comes from the Latin fidere, which means “to trust.” If you’ve used the Lucero App, you might have seen this word before. Hint: It’s the title of Island 2 because the 28-day experience is designed to help improve your sense of confidence. You could say […]
Why Emotional Regulation is so Important for Teens
The teen years are known for intense emotions with good reason. First, the prefrontal cortex – the part of the brain in charge of reasoning, logic and impulse control – is still developing in teens. Second, the hormones that spark puberty’s physical changes also amp up activity in the emotional and reward-seeking centers of the […]
5 Facts Parents Need to Know about the Teen Brain
“What was he thinking? Is this really my child?!” Parents of teenagers can empathize when Frances Jensen describes her fifteen-year-old son’s hair dye disaster. Her “sweet-natured firstborn son had suddenly become unfamiliar and unpredictable.” Jensen was baffled, but as a neuroscientist at Harvard Medical School, she had an edge in understanding his impulsive behavior and […]
