It has always been said that women mature before men. And the truth is that the female gender generally tends to develop earlier, with the changes typical of puberty beginning between the ages of ten and twelve in women, while men generally begin to notice them between the ages of twelve and fifteen.
This fact can be observed at the physical level, but also at the level of mental maturity. Why does this fact occur? Why do girls mature earlier than boys? To answer this question, let’s start with the most basic.
In order to better understand the topic at hand, it may be useful to make it clear what element we are referring to exactly when we talk about maturity.
The term maturity refers to moment at which a person or object has reached its maximum level of development Generally it tends to be linked to time and age. When most people say that one person is more or less mature than the other, they tend to refer to their behavior or way of acting or responding to situations.
A mature person is capable of self-management, taking responsibility for their actions adopt different perspectives, be critical of both the world and oneself and be able to adapt to situations and respond to the demands of reality.
Maturity is reached largely thanks to the experiences that each person has throughout their development, while said development also depends largely on biological aspects that allow it. Being mature depends largely on our brain development.
Our nervous system is a set of elements of great importance for our survival from the moment we are born. But it is not a system that remains unchanged, but rather one that develops and changes appear throughout our development.
At birth we have a large number of neurons , but they are usually poorly connected to each other, with relatively few existing synapses. From that moment and throughout much of our childhood, our brain is immersed in a process of constant neurogenesis, multiplying the number of neurons and establishing connections between them. This allows us to have a much greater learning potential and brain plasticity than in other periods of our lives.
In this period of development, both men and women have an equivalent number of neurons and show a similar development in terms of their level of maturity.
As we live, experience, move, and pay attention to what surrounds us and what we do and think, our body strengthens the most used synapses and strengthening the connection between neuronal groups and fibers. Different areas, such as the frontal cortex, mature and develop more and more. But there is a point during development when neurogenesis stalls, and large numbers of neurons begin to die. This is neuronal pruning.
Neural pruning
The so-called neuronal pruning or synaptic pruning is a a biological process that occurs primarily during adolescence in which a large proportion of the neurons present in our nervous system degrade and die.
Although apparently the fact that a large number of neurons degrade and die may seem negative, the truth is that this fact fulfills a very important function. Specifically fulfills the function of optimizing the functioning of our brain eliminating those connections that we practically do not use, allowing greater efficiency of different mental processes that have proven useful for the subject during their growth.
In this way, our brain gets rid of those connections that we do not use or that offer redundant information. The brain is reorganized so that the most used connections survive and are allows the processing and integration of information becomes increasingly more efficient, spending fewer mental resources and therefore being able to better invest those we have available.
And this neuronal pruning is where the main reason why the female sex usually presents earlier maturity than their male counterparts Various research shows that the neural pruning process begins early in women, which allows them to optimize their neural networks and in many cases reach mental maturity.
Hormonal aspects
One of the main reasons for this fact can be found in hormones. While in men, sex hormones are observed in the first phases of development to later stagnate until entering puberty In females, the hormonal cycle and estrogen secretion are stable and continuous throughout the entire development period. This allows an acceleration of the moment in which puberty occurs.
The effect of the environment
The different investigations carried out reflect that, as a general rule, women mature before men. Thus, they generally develop certain cognitive and emotional capacities earlier, especially during adolescence and young adulthood.
It should also be noted that social expectations and gender roles have a powerful effect on how we act. Traditionally gender roles have caused that man has been educated in a way that tends to promote competitiveness and individuality while women have received an education focused on caring for others, self-management and preservation.
This can cause them to take different aspects into account when acting, leading to different degrees of maturity. However, this effect decreases as the typical roles become blurred.
But this does not necessarily imply greater maturity on the part of the female sex. And despite the fact that this trend exists, we must take into account that The level of maturity depends largely on the conditions in which we grow , external stimulation and what we experience throughout our lives. An environment that favors maturity or one that infantilizes subjects can mean that both men and women can face situations more or less effectively and reach different degrees of maturity at the same age.
