With several young Parkland (Fla.) school shooting survivors calling for heightened gun regulations, Laurence Steinberg argues in a New York Times op-ed that the U.S. should lower its voting age from 18 to 16. “Studies of cold cognition have shown that the skills necessary to make informed decisions are firmly in place by 16,” he writes, refuting the notion that teenagers are “notoriously impulsive and hotheaded.” He goes on to explain, “By that age, adolescents can gather and process information, weigh pros and cons, reason logically with facts, and take time before making a decision. Teenagers may sometimes make bad choices, but statistically speaking, they do not make them any more often than adults do.”
Source: New York Times