青少年犯罪行为与发育成熟

摘要

Whether juvenile delinquents are appropriate to be convicted and incarcerated as adults for criminal act continue to be a hot debate. In this article, the author argued that the answer should be ‘no’. She based her argument on the recent neurocognitive evidence of still developing prefrontal cortex of adolescents, which make them less culpable for their actions. The situation is even worse for juvenile delinquents as they are at higher risk of abuse and trauma, which resulted in greater impairment of the prefrontal cortex. As a conclusion, the author urged that the current justice system should take into consideration the neurocognitive immaturity of juvenile delinquents when they are charged with a criminal act.%青少年罪犯是否需要以成人身份为其犯罪行为接受检控及监禁一直备受争议。在本文中，作者的答案是否定的。其以近期神经认知科学的发现为论据，指出青少年的前额皮层仍在发育中，故不应因其行为而受到太大惩罚。前额皮层的不成熟在青少年罪犯中尤为明显，因为其有更大的机会受到虐待及遭到创伤，导致前额皮层受损。作者促请现行法律制度在检控青少年犯罪时需考虑其在神经认知方面发育未全。