Abstract
Policy-makers are considering large-scale early intervention programs to enhance children's self-control, with the aim of reducing crime and improving citizens' health and wealth. Experimental studies and economic analyses are suggesting that such programs could reap benefits for a nation. Yet, how important is childhood self-control for the health, wealth, and public safety of the adult population? Following a population-representative 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 retirement, and also physical health and illness diagnosed via biomarkers. These effects of the children's self-control could be disentangled from their 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, despite sharing the same parents and family background. These predictions from childhood followed a gradient of self-control, suggesting a nation's health and wealth could be improved by enhancing self-control in all of its children. Early interventions enhancing the population's self-control skills might reduce taxpayer costs of crime control, health care, and old-age dependency.