Why Are Girls Hitting Puberty Earlier?
This video is presented by Jayde Lovell and Bec Susan Gill, Directed by Mizanur Rahman, and Edited by Emily Lin. Guess what - Girls are experiencing puberty earlier! I know right. Okay so here’s a quick timeline: In 1860, around when my grandmothers grandmother, Margaret Ross, was born, girls hit puberty at around 16 years old. By the time my grandmother Nan was born, that age had dropped to 14 years old. When my mummy (Mama Sheens!) was born – that average age had dropped to around 10 years old And today, if I’d had a baby Jayde – she would have hit puberty around 9 years old. We don’t put hormones in chicken in the US – it’s not legal – we explain this in another vid. So why are kids, specifically girls, hitting puberty super duper early? Ok! So the reason science doesn’t have any idea why this is happening is becase it’s a really tricky problem. We can’t just take two babies and raise one in the 1860s and one in modern times, you just couldn’t simulate that 1860s environment. And even if you could (or you had a time machine!) the ethics committee that has to approve all scientific studies would never agree to it, because, like they didn’t have antibiotics back then. So because science can’t do a proper controlled study on this stuff, we can only try to look at correlations. Like for example obesity. We see there’s more fat kids than ever before, and puberty is earlier than ever before – so maybe having more fat on our bodies at an earlier age has something to do with it. That’s what scientists at the Virginia school of medicine suggested in 2010. Or maybe it’s all the stresses of the modern education system. That’s what scientists at the University of Texas discussed in 2007. Or maybe it’s all those chemicals in the environment - for example BPA, which is a chemical that can mimic estrogen and is found everywhere - in plastics, paper, canned food, receipts lot of stuff. That’s what scientists in Turkey suggested in 2011. Well, probably not – but early puberty just sucks for the kids dealing with it. Think of it, half of all 9 year old girls are now growing boobs and some are starting to have periods, that’s just super duper early for their body to be changing compared to how mature their mind is. It’s really young for girls to be dealing with tampons, understanding periods and pregnancy, and what sex is and all that stuff. But in addition to the psychological element, early puberty can also be bad for your health later in life. What science does know is that girls who hit puberty early have a 30% increase in risk of breast cancer later in life. They’re also more likely to get pregnant as teenagers, and suffer from HPV, heart disease, diabetes, and something called all-cause mortality, which means the thing that ultimately ends their life, cancer or whatever, comes earlier so they die younger. That sucks. Early puberty aint great for mental health either - Girls who develop early are at greater risk for depression, are more likely to drink, smoke and have sex earlier. Now, that’s not to say that early puberty causes all these problems – but there are some disturbing correlations. SOURCE: http://spq.sagepub.com/content/70/2/1... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artic... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artic... https://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/earl... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24... http://center4research.org/child-teen... http://healthland.time.com/2012/11/14... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artic... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artic... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artic... SCIQ ON THE YOUNG TURKS Produced by Jayde Lovell and Bec Susan Gill. ScIQ is a partner of the The Young Turks Network. Follow SciQ on Twitter: / sciq_tyt Follow SciQ on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sciq.tyt?ref=hl Follow Jayde on Twitter: / jaydelovell Follow Jayde on Instagram: www.instagram.com/jaydelovell Follow Bec on Twitter: / becsusangill Follow Bec on Instagram: / becsusangill CONTACT For enquiries – please email [email protected] or [email protected]
