What goes right is more important than what goes wrong

From The Heart Grows Smarter by David Brooks.

Longitudinal studies are great but you have to be careful about how they evolve over time. Especially when you start to look for things much later in the study different from what you were looking for when you began.

It’s not that the men who flourished had perfect childhoods. Rather, as Vaillant puts it, “What goes right is more important than what goes wrong.” The positive effect of one loving relative, mentor or friend can overwhelm the negative effects of the bad things that happen.

In case after case, the magic formula is capacity for intimacy combined with persistence, discipline, order and dependability. The men who could be affectionate about people and organized about things had very enjoyable lives.

But a childhood does not totally determine a life. The beauty of the Grant Study is that, as Vaillant emphasizes, it has followed its subjects for nine decades. The big finding is that you can teach an old dog new tricks. The men kept changing all the way through, even in their 80s and 90s.

I think Vaillant is very much on the mark: “What goes right is more important than what goes wrong.” So much of our sociological and policy research is focused on trying find what goes wrong in childhood and fixing that rather than trying to understand what are the magical elements of what has to go right. Humans, and especially children, are immensely resilient. We can overcome many reversals. But there are a few things that critically need to go right in order to improve the odds that a life will play out in a positive fashion.

Our research into reading suggests that a handful of actions in the first four or five years have an exceptional impact on school readiness, grades, reading capability, etc. These actions are: having plenty of books around, routinely reading to a child, letting them choose stories, lots of conversation, and being seen to read oneself. All cheap and easy.

As Brooks observes, "The positive effect of one loving relative" can make all the difference. It is similar with children reading. Every habitual reader can tell you two or three books from their childhood that were a catalyst to their love of reading. The right book at the right time in the right place. Impossible to identify in advance or to specify. All you can do is create the right circumstances where it is likely that a child will engage with that particular catalytic book.

On a somewhat separate note, this comment "The big finding is that you can teach an old dog new tricks. The men kept changing all the way through, even in their 80s and 90s" reminded me of Aeschylus' line in Agamemnon (line 928)

Only when man's life comes to its end in prosperity can one call that man happy.

I prefer the more succinct rendering "Call no man happy till he is dead."