But we are absolutely designed to be attractive peers and to do everything possible to become attractive peers.

You know testosterone as one example is not only there to make our voices lower and grow hair on our bodies and big muscles, which is important

for survival as you become an adult, it's also there to clue us into the social zeitgeist.

It's all about what's my role in this hierarchy.

And once kids hit puberty,

they care immensely more than they have before

and more than they ever will again

about how others perceive them.

And it's because of testosterone that we start to gauge ourselves against others.

And you know it's not always competition and fighting in terms of fighting or out racing someone

or being a better football player, you know, in various

settings depending on what the culture is that will determine how people compete.

So you know in in monasteries Tibetan monks in training adolescent boys compete to be

more kind and compassionate than other Tibetan Buddhist monks. So one of the lessons

here for parents is that you really want to think about what social groups your kid is in and

you want to help to guide that as much as you can because if they're on the swim

team and the goal is to be the fastest swimmer that's like a really great goal

to have or to be one of the better swimmers but if they're not

getting fulfillment from swimming or academics or playing in a rock band or whatever else it is

they'll find themselves at the bottom of this pecking order and other brain changes will absolutely take

effect that will make it more likely that they hang out with kids who aren't engaged in such

exciting things and are not doing well in school and using drugs and that kind of thing.

...