Policy-makers are considering large-scale programs aimed at self-control to improve citizens’ health and wealth and reduce crime. Experimental and economic studies suggest such programs could reap benefits. Yet, is self-control important for the health, wealth, and public safety of the population? Following a cohort of 1,000 children from birth to the age of 32 y, we show that childhood self-control predicts physical health, substance dependence, personal finances, and criminal offending outcomes, following a gradient of self-control. Effects of children's self-control could be disentangled from their intelligence and social class as well as from mistakes they made as adolescents. In another cohort of 500 sibling-pairs, the sibling with lower self-control had poorer outcomes, despite shared family background. Interventions addressing self-control might reduce a panoply of societal costs, save taxpayers money, and promote prosperity.

This article reports on the childhood origins and adult outcomes of female versus male antisocial behavior trajectories in the Dunedin longitudinal study. Four antisocial behavior trajectory groups were identified among females and males using general growth mixture modeling and included life-course persistent (LCP), adolescent-onset, childhood-limited, and low trajectory groups. During childhood, both LCP females and males were characterized by social, familial and neurodevelopmental risk factors, whereas those on the adolescent-onset pathway were not. At age 32, women and men on the LCP pathway were engaging in serious violence and experiencing significant mental health, physical health, and economic problems. Females and males on the adolescent-onset pathway were also experiencing difficulties at age 32, although to a lesser extent. Although more males than females followed the LCP trajectory, findings support similarities across gender with respect to developmental trajectories of antisocial behavior and their associated childhood origins and adult consequences. Implications for theory, research, and practice are discussed.

We report data that support the distinction between childhood-onset and adolescent-onset type conduct problems. Natural histories are described from a representative birth cohort of 457 males studied longitudinally from age 3 to 18 years. Childhood-and adolescent-onset cases differed on temperament as early as age 3 years, but almost half of childhood-onset cases did not become seriously delinquent. Type comparisons were consistent with our contention that males whose antisocial behavior follows a life-course-pcrsistent path differ from males who follow an adolescence-limited path. As adolescents, the two types differed on convictions for violent crime, personality profiles, school leaving, and bonds to family. These differences can be attributed to developmental history because the two groups were well matched on measures of antisocial conduct at age 18 years: parent-reports, self-reports, and adjudication records. By age 18 years, many conduct-problem boys had encountered factors that could ensnare them in an antisocial future: substance dependence, unsafe sex, dangerous driving habits, delinquent friends, delinquent perceptions, and unemployment. Implications for theory, research design, prevention, and therapeutic treatment of conduct problems are highlighted.Theantisocial behavior of adolescents bears in the face of evidence that most serious serious consequences for individuals, fami-property and violent crimes are now cornlies, communities, and society. The general mitted by teenaged offenders and evidence public has forsaken its credulous notions that almost all violent and predatory adult of "teenaged hijinks" and "boyish pranks" antisocial careers originate in juvenile conduct problems. Despite a sense of urgency -.about reducing adolescent antisocial behavThis research was supported by USPHS Grant MH-j o r > scientific progress toward that goal has to T. Moffitt from the Violence and Traumatic h a m p e r e d by great diversity inherent stress Branch of the National Institute of Mentalr j i , Health and by the William Freeman Vilas Trust at the within the broad class of adolescents who University of Wisconsin. The Dunedin Multidiscipli-engage in antisocial behaviors. Apportionnary Health and Development Research Unit is sup-j n g this heterogeneity into meaningful subported by the New Zealand Health Research Council. t y p e s n a s ^e n the focus of much taxonomic Gee, and Charlotte Paul, and the New Zealand Police Motfitt, 1993a; Quay, 1987). generously shared data with us. We arc grateful to our " Developmentalists are now reaching a staff, and to the study members and their parents and consensus that antisocial behavior follows tcac l 1 " sat least two primary developmental courses, Address correspondence and reprint requests to: ... , . , , , , "_ "_,. t u~. ~tu*.m,uu Terrie E. Moffitt, University of Wisconsin-Madison, o n e W l t h childhood-onset and the other with Dpt. of Psychology, 1202 W.Johnson St.. Madison, later, generally postpubertal onset (e.g., 53706. Farrington et al., 1990; Loeber &...

Context: A cardinal feature of the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for conduct disorder is the distinction between childhood-vs adolescent-onset subtypes. Whether such developmental subtypes exist in the population and have different prognoses should be rigorously tested to inform the DSM-V.Objectives: To evaluate the epidemiological validity of childhood-vs adolescent-onset conduct problems in a prospective birth cohort, and to assess whether life-coursepersistent conduct problems are associated with a greater adult health burden.Design, Setting, and Participants: Our sample includes 526 male study members in the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study, a 1-year birth cohort (April1,1972,throughMarch30,1973.Developmental trajectories were defined using prospective ratings of conduct problems at 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 18, 21, and 26 years of age. Main Outcome Measures:Health burden was assessed as mental and physical health problems at 32 years of age measured via diagnostic interviews and physical examinations. Results:We identified the following 4 developmental subtypes of conduct problems through general growth mixture modeling:(1)childhood-onset/life-course-persistent,(2)adolescent onset, (3) childhood limited, and (4) low. At 32 years of age, study members with the life-course-persistent subtype experienced the worst health burden. To a lesser extent, those with the adolescent-onset subtype also experienced health problems. A childhood-limited subtype not specified by DSM-IV was revealed; its adult health outcomes were within the range of the cohort norm. Conclusions:Results support the epidemiological validity of the DSM-IV conduct disorder distinction based on age of onset but highlight the need to also consider long-term persistence to refine diagnosis. Preventing and treating conduct problems has the potential to reduce the adult health burden.

In a longitudinal study of a birth cohort, the authors identified youth involved in each of 4 different health-risk behaviors at age 21: alcohol dependence, violent crime, unsafe sex, and dangerous driving habits. At age 18, the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (MPQ) was used to assess 10 distinct personality traits. At age 3, observational measures were used to classify children into distinct temperament groups. Results showed that a similar constellation of adolescent personality traits, with developmental origins in childhood, is linked to different health-risk behaviors at 21. Associations between the same personality traits and different health-risk behaviors were not an artifact of the same people engaging in different health-risk behaviors; rather, these associations implicated the same personality type in different but related behaviors. In planning campaigns, health professionals may need to design programs that appeal to the unique psychological makeup of persons most at risk for health-risk behaviors.