It's really naiveté. More experienced "smarter" people will know how difficult some task really is and may not even start it. Someone young is likely naive, perhaps over confident in the simplicity of a task, and will drive head on into solving it. Of course once progress is made that becomes motivation to continue.

This doesn't mean that being naive is perfect. The majority of the people who try the difficult task will probably still just crash and burn, but the naiveté compels more than normal numbers of people to risk it in the first place.