Self-control may be the secret to success, according to a persuasive new study that followed 1,000 children from birth to age 32:children who showed early signs of self-y were not only less likely to have developed addictions or committed a crime by hood, but were also healthier and wealthier than their more impulsive peers.
Problems sucing in adolescence, such as becoming a smoker or getting pregnant, accounted for about half of the bad outcomes associated with low self-control in childhood. Kids who scored low on such measures--for instance, becoming easily frustrated, lacking persistence in reaching goals or performing tasks, or having difficulty waiting their turn in line--were roughly three times more likely to wind up as poor, addicted, single parents or to have multiple health problems as s, compared with children who behaved more conscientiously as early as age 3.
"This is a great study, mining a huge treasury of data to tease apart the relationships among some really important factors that can determine the direction of our lives," says Martha Farah. director of the Center for Neuroscience (神经科学)and Society at the University of Pennsylvania. "It highlights how incredibly important self-control is."
Dr. Bruce Perry, professor of psychiatry (精神病学) at Northwestern University, agrees. "It’s a very cool study. This is taken from data from what is probably the best long-term study in our field."
The new research confirms the findings of the famous Stanford marshmallow (棉花糖) study, which found that young children who were able to resist grabbing a soft marshmallow placed in front of them--for 15 long minutes--in order to get two of them later scored an average of 210 points higher on the SAT than kids who couldn’t wait. About one-third of the 4-to-6-year-olds studied were able to withstand the sweet temptation. As in the current research, the kids with more self-control in the marshmallow trial had better life outcomes across the board.

The problems appearing in adolescence take up about 50% of the bad outcomes related to（）.

Self-control may be the secret to success, according to a persuasive new study that followed 1,000 children from birth to age 32:children who showed early signs of self-y were not only less likely to have developed addictions or committed a crime by hood, but were also healthier and wealthier than their more impulsive peers.
Problems sucing in adolescence, such as becoming a smoker or getting pregnant, accounted for about half of the bad outcomes associated with low self-control in childhood. Kids who scored low on such measures--for instance, becoming easily frustrated, lacking persistence in reaching goals or performing tasks, or having difficulty waiting their turn in line--were roughly three times more likely to wind up as poor, addicted, single parents or to have multiple health problems as s, compared with children who behaved more conscientiously as early as age 3.
"This is a great study, mining a huge treasury of data to tease apart the relationships among some really important factors that can determine the direction of our lives," says Martha Farah. director of the Center for Neuroscience (神经科学)and Society at the University of Pennsylvania. "It highlights how incredibly important self-control is."
Dr. Bruce Perry, professor of psychiatry (精神病学) at Northwestern University, agrees. "It’s a very cool study. This is taken from data from what is probably the best long-term study in our field."
The new research confirms the findings of the famous Stanford marshmallow (棉花糖) study, which found that young children who were able to resist grabbing a soft marshmallow placed in front of them--for 15 long minutes--in order to get two of them later scored an average of 210 points higher on the SAT than kids who couldn’t wait. About one-third of the 4-to-6-year-olds studied were able to withstand the sweet temptation. As in the current research, the kids with more self-control in the marshmallow trial had better life outcomes across the board.