Protecting You/Protecting Me focuses on preventing damage to the developing brain from age 12 to the mid 20's, when the exposure to alcohol is the greatest among American teens.

• The Brain continues to develop well into a person's mid 20's. At birth roughly 40% of the brain cells are connected. _{Bellis and Clark,2000}
• Before the age of 10, the brain is developing the basic capacities of survival - vision, speech, memory, emotions, attention, concentration, and fine and gross motor skills. _{Giedd J ,1999}
• In the pre-teen years the brain is engaged in managing puberty, learning to think abstractly and forming more sophisticated relationships. _{Giedd J ,1999}
• In the last few years - through a person's mid 20's - the brain is involved in developing self-awareness, highly complex interpersonal relationships, highly complex abstract thinking and spirituality, and the ability to plan, make complex judgments - including moral judgments, creating and problem solving…moving beyond the basics toward maturity. _{Giedd J ,1999}
• From 12 to the mid 20's, the years in which American teens are the most exposed to alcohol, three critical periods of development take place, each accompanied by a spurt of neural (dendrite) growth: _{Giedd J ,1999}
  • Level I Abstract Thinking - 10-20 years - development of ability to relate functions - such as the ability to relate addition and subtraction and understand why they are opposites, and the ability to combine dissimilar social interactions and emotions - such as combining honesty or dishonesty with kindness to explain the "social lie".
  • Level II Abstract Thinking - 14-15 years - development of the ability to understand how functions are alike and different - such as how addition and division are alike and different, and the ability to combine complex thinking with social interactions and emotions - such as combining judgment with directness, kindness and tact at the same time to offer constructive criticism.
  • Level III Abstract Thinking - 18-20 years - development of the ability to hold several issues, events, circumstances, functions, characteristics, etc., in mind at the same time and compare and interrelate them.
• Anything that interferes with how the brain operates during this 20 + year period can change the course of a person's mental, emotional, cognitive, and social development…and alter his or her opportunities for success. _{White, et all 2001}