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SUMMARY:Foresight and Self-Control - Professor Terrie Moffitt\, Duke Unive
 rsity
DTSTART:20130301T173000Z
DTEND:20130301T183000Z
UID:TALK40000@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Janet Gibson
DESCRIPTION:Abstract\n\nYoung Children's Self-control: Foreseeing Health a
 nd Wealth\n\nPolicy-makers are considering large-scale early intervention 
 programs to enhance children's self-control\, with the aim of reducing cri
 me and improving citizens' health and wealth. Experimental studies and eco
 nomic analyses are suggesting that such programs could reap benefits for a
  nation. Yet\, how important is childhood self-control for the health\, we
 alth\, and public safety of the adult population? Following a population-r
 epresentative cohort of 1000 New Zealand children from their birth in 1972
  to age 38 in 2011\, we show that childhood self-control predicts criminal
  offending\, addiction\, personal finances\, benefit use\, savings for ret
 irement\, and also physical health and illness diagnosed via biomarkers. T
 hese effects of the children's self-control could be disentangled from the
 ir intelligence and their parents' social-class. In another cohort of 500 
 UK twin-sibling-pairs\, the sibling with better self-control at age 5 had 
 better life outcomes than his twin sibling with weaker self-control\, desp
 ite sharing the same parents and family background. These predictions from
  childhood followed a gradient of self-control\, suggesting a nation's hea
 lth and wealth could be improved by enhancing self-control in all of its c
 hildren. Early interventions enhancing the population's self-control skill
 s might reduce taxpayer costs of crime control\, health care\, and old-age
  dependency. \n\nBiography\n\nTERRIE E. MOFFITT studies how genetic and en
 vironmental risks work\ntogether to shape the developmental course of abno
 rmal human behaviors\nand psychiatric disorders. Her particular interest i
 s in antisocial and\ncriminal behavior\, but she also studies depression\,
  psychosis\, and\nsubstance abuse. She is associate director of the Dunedi
 n Longitudinal Study\, which\nfollows 1000 people born in 1972 in New Zeal
 and from birth to age 38\, so\nfar. She also co-directs the Environmental-
 Risk Longitudinal Twin Study\,\nwhich follows1100 British families with tw
 ins born in 1994-1995 from\nbirth to age 18\, so far. On behalf of these s
 tudies\, she has received the American\nPsychological Association's Early 
 Career Contribution Award (1993)\, the\nRoyal Society-Wolfson Merit Award 
 (2002)\, the Stockholm Prize in\nCriminology (2007)\, the NARSAD Ruane Pri
 ze (2010) and the Klaus J. Jacobs Prize (2010). She is a fellow of the Aca
 demy of Medical Sciences\, the American Society of Criminology\, the Briti
 sh Academy\, Academia Europaea\, the American Academy of Political and Soc
 ial Science\, the Association for Psychological Science\,\nand King's Coll
 ege London. She is a trustee of the Nuffield Foundation. She works at Duke
  University\, in North Carolina in the USA\, at the Institute of Psychiatr
 y\, King's\nCollege London in the UK\, and at the Dunedin School of Medici
 ne\, in New\nZealand. Her favorite activities are camping and hiking trips
  in Africa\,\nAsia and the South Pacific\, and working on her poison-ivy f
 arm in North Carolina.\nLearn more at this website:  WWW.MOFFITTCASPI.COM 
 \n
LOCATION:LMH\, Lady Mitchell Hall
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