I often thought about it. I feel like in many aspects (relationships included) I haven't grown up, whatever that means. I have quite weird (?) memory, as I'm still remembering school days like it was maybe a year ago, not over 20. Also, never being in a romantic relationship, I kind of didn't have the opportunity to "progress", I'm still at level 0. I often still feel like that shy 17-18 yo I was back then. So while I'm mostly not attracted to actual high-schoolers for various reasons, I can relate pretty easily to characters in JVN high-school settings.
Also, because I've been kind of "frozen" for the last 20 years, I have somewhat skewed age perception. By that I mean, that when I think a girl is just a few years younger than me, she turns out to actually be 18-19, when I think she's roughly my age, she's often actually in her mid 20s, and when I look at girls that actually are my age, I often feel like they are much older than me
Back to VNs - while, like I said above, I can relate to high-school characters, I also can appreciate adult settings. I loved The Language of Love.