Episode Details

Why are teens so emotional? Why won’t they listen when adults depart their worldly knowledge? Why won’t they tidy their rooms?

Well, there are plenty of parenting books out there that attempt to answer these questions, but in the new book Why Your Parents Are Driving You Up the Wall and What To Do About It (£8.99, Penguin) by neuroscientist, comedian and science writer Dean Burnett, for the first time, it’s teens who are getting an insight into their parents’ minds.

The book is all about reverse parenting, and offers teens an answer to why their parents are always dragging them out of bed, why they’re so obsessed with asking ‘How was school?’ and other common complaints.

He speaks to BBC Science Focus editorial assistant Amy Barrett.

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Listen to more episodes of the Science Focus Podcast:

• Bill Bryson: What should we know about how our bodies work
• Are Generation Z our only hope for the future? – John Higgs
• Randall Munroe: How do you find the worst solution to any problem?
• What we got wrong about pandas and teenagers
• How emotions are made – Lisa Feldman Barrett
• The neuroscience of happiness – Dean Burnett

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