2006-07

• Council Member Charles Nelson was interviewed in the article “Orphanages Stunt Mental Growth, a Study Finds" in the New York Times (December 21, 2007) about recently published research co-authored with Council Member Nathan Fox. The research was conducted in Romania and tracked children who lived with their biological families, in orphanages, or with foster families. At four years old, children who lived with their biological families scored significantly higher on IQ tests than children who lived with foster families, who scored higher than those who remained in the orphanages. “Institutions and environments vary enormously across the world and within countries,” said Dr. Nelson, “but I think these findings generalize to many situations, from kids in institutions to those in abusive households and even bad foster care arrangements.”

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• Council Chair Jack Shonkoff was featured in two publications about his lectures as part of a Colloquium Series hosted by the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. The article, “Experts Discuss Lifelong Impact of Early Childhood Adversity,” published in Harvard Public Health NOW (December 7, 2007), describes Shonkoff’s presentation at Harvard School of Public Health with discussants Ichiro Kawachi and David Williams about the causal relationship between early childhood adversity and lifelong impairments in physical and mental health. The article “From neuroscience to childhood policy: Shonkoff demonstrates how research leads to lawmaking," published on the HarvardScience website (December 7, 2007), described Shonkoff's presentation at the Kennedy School of Government with Representative Ruth Kagi (D-WA) and Senator Wes Hayes (R-SC). Shonkoff discussed how the healthy development of children is the foundation for economic productivity, responsible citizenship, and lifelong physical and mental health. Shonkoff said: “Science can add new insights into how health, learning, and competencies develop over time, beyond just the social and political contextual factors." 

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• Council Member Charles Nelson was interviewed on The Today Show about the detrimental effects of institutionalization on children in Serbia (November 14, 2007). Nelson describes how children who are intitutionalized are more likely to have developmental delays, and for every two months that a child spends in a bad institution, he or she is set back one month of linear, normative development.

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• Council Members Greg Duncan and Ross Thompson were featured in “Bad Behavior Does Not Doom Pupils, Studies Say,” in the New York Times (November 13, 2007). The article describes two new studies, which suggest that children with behavior problems may be able to attain the same academic success as their peers. “For kindergarten, it appears teachers are able to work around these behavior problems in a way that enables kids to learn just as much as other kids with equal levels of ability," said Duncan. Thompson noted that it is still important not to discount programs that guide preschoolers’ emotional development: “That would be a double whammy for really difficult kids…to have no help managing their behavior and then – wham! – to get labeled as problem kids as soon as they enter school.” 

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• Council Member Deborah Phillips was interviewed on ABC Radio National in Australia for the “Life Matters” program (November 8, 2007). In a segment called “Investing in the under-5s,” Phillips spoke about early childhood development, including topics such as child care, social-emotional development, and how children respond to stress.

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• Council Contributing Member Art Rolnick was featured in a broadcast on National Public Radio on October 26, 2007. The broadcast highlighted Rolnick's plan for the Minnesota Early Learning Foundation to provide children who are poor with scholarships to participate in high quality, early education programs. The goal is that, by investing in the early years and providing children with access to high quality, early education programs, Minnesota will attract more high quality programs to its neighborhoods and, long term, the children involved will be less likely to need special education, to be arrested, or have other expensive problems later on.

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• The San Francisco Chronicle featured an open forum article (September 17, 2007), "All in the genes?" about the value of using science as an argument for early education. Citing the release of "A Science-Based Framework for Early Childhood Policy", co-authored by the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child and the National Forum on Early Childhood Program Evaluation, the author makes the case that early childhood programs can have a significant impact on children from all backgrounds and social classes.

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• Council Chair Jack Shonkoff and Deputy Director Gillian Najarian were interviewed for a feature in Ed., the magazine of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, "Science Says: When it comes to growing young minds, it's better to get it right the first time than to try to fix it later" (Spring 2007). The article highlights what science tells us about the link among neuroscience, behavioral development, and education in early childhood.

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• On May 30, 2007, ABC News' Good Morning America featured Council Chair Jack Shonkoff in an interview for a story about Miami family court judge Cindy Lederman, who created a prorgram for parents who come through the court system to provide a more stable, nurturing environment. A print version of the story, "Judge Develops Groundbreaking Experiment for Children," is available on the ABC/GMA website.

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• Education Week covered the National Summit for America's Children ("Congressional Attention Sought for Early-Childhood Education", May 23, 2007), and included quotes from Council member Pat Levitt, Council Contributing Member (and keynote speaker) James Heckman, and Council Chair Jack Shonkoff.

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• Council Chair Jack Shonkoff was interviewed for a feature in the Spokane Spokesman-Review, "Success rooted in childhood," (April 22, 2007). The interview was part of a month-long special report by the Spokane daily on the issue of preventing child abuse and neglect, Our Kids, Our Business.

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• Council Member Pat Levitt was interviewed for a podcast used by the Vanderbilt Center for Science Outreach called  " Snacks 4 the Brain" (March 11, 2007). Levitt spoke about the importance of bringing together people from different fields of science, practice, research, and academia to increase the knowledge base and improve treatment of children and adolescents. According to the interviewer, “I have to say the 30 or so minutes we chatted were among the most enjoyable and enlightening I’ve spent in these nearly two years of interviewing some of the most interesting people in science.”

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• Council Contributing Member Bruce McEwen is quoted in a Time magazine article, "6 Lessons for Handling Stress," (January 19, 2007), "We're learning that post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), burnout, chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia are all related in some ways," says McEwen. The article is part of a special section touted on the cover as "The Brain: A User's Guide."

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• Two Boston Globe editorials recently quoted Council chair Jack Shonkoff. The first, “Early action on early education,” (Dec. 5, 2006) lays out the science basis for a new early childhood initiative in Boston. The second, “The science behind the violence,” (Jan. 17, 2007) smartly connects the science of early childhood development to larger societal issues, such as teen violence.

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• On NPR's "On Point with Tom Ashbrook ," (November 27, 2006), Council Member Pat Levitt was featured as one of three experts talking about autism.

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• In the Boston Globe (November 11, 2006), Council Member Charles A. Nelson, was featured in the article, "Study on orphans sees benefit in family care" by Colin Nickerson. " 'In almost every case, the sooner an orphan is placed with a family, the better off that child will be,' said Charles A. Nelson, professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and one of the lead researchers on the Bucharest Early Intervention Project."

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• On CNN Headline News and CNN Radio News (November 7, 2006), Council Member Betsy Lozoff was interviewed for a story on her study focused on iron deficiency in babies.

• In Business Week (Oct. 23, 2006), "Going Beyond Head Start," features comments by Council Member Eric Knudsen and Contributing Members Art Rolnick and James J. Heckman, building the economic, social, and neuroscience case for early investment in children the preschool years. "The research is overwhelming," says Rolnick in the article. "It all comes down to the earlier, the better."

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• Council Member and Vanderbilt Kennedy Center director Pat Levitt, research fellow Daniel Campbell, and colleagues have identified a common gene variant that more than doubles the risk of autism. The findings were published in the October 16, 2006 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In an interview, Dr. Levitt said, "The more genetic vulnerability genes we identify, the better handle we have on designing experiments to look at gene-environment interactions. We think this will be the way to understand autism and prevent it." These findings are garnering considerable national and international media interest, with the Reuters report being picked up by CNN, ABC News, MSNBC, Fox News, and others.

  Reuters (NAT) - Mutated gene raises autism risk, U.S. study finds >>

  Medindia.com - Risk of Autism Doubled with Single Gene Mutation >>

  DailyRecord.co.uk - Gene Clue to Autism >>

• Council Chair Jack Shonkoff, Council Member Megan Gunnar, and Council Contributing Member Art Rolnick are among those quoted in several September and October 2006 articles about the recent symposium honoring child health policy pioneer Julius Richmond and the related founding of the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, which Shonkoff directs. Gunnar, who presented at the symposium, said, "The early years of life matter because the ongoing interaction between early experience and gene expression affects the architecture of the maturing brain." Said Shonkoff, Harvard Public Health NOW, "If there is anything on which people can come together, it is our shared investment in children’s health and well-being."

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• On NPR's All Things Considered (September 2006), Council Member Charles A. Nelson, Ph.D., was interviewed by Sasha Aslanian for a story about the Romanian orphanage study. "After communism fell in Romania, the outside world was outraged at the discovery of orphanages filled with neglected children. As Sasha Aslanian of American RadioWorks reports, scientists studying the effects of the deprivation are trying to learn how much recovery is possible."

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• The Council’s July 2006 paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) establishes the scientific basis for why helping all children have quality early experiences—primarily positive, stable interactions with nurturing adults—is good economic policy. This paper by Council Members Eric Knudsen and Judy L. Cameron, Council Chair Jack P. Shonkoff, and Council Contributing Member James J. Heckman, has attracted considerable attention. It was one of the PNAS website’s 20 most-read papers during the month of September 2006, and one of the top ten downloads from the Institute for the Study of Labor’s website. "What we're pointing out in this paper is that the earlier you spend money on disadvantaged people, the more cost-effective it is," Knudsen says in The Stanford Report article.

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• Time magazine author Pamela Paul quotes Council Members Pat Levitt and Ross Thompson in her January 8, 2006 article Want a Brainier Baby?, which takes to task the growing perception that educational videos and DVD's are an efficient means to aid in the intellectual development of children. In the article, Pat Levitt lends credence to the concern that too much visual stimulation in early childhood can negatively affect development. Ross Thompson adds that direct parental interaction is a more successful teaching tool than educational videos because "[t]he infant brain craves novel stimulation."

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• In a January 8, 2006  Dana Alliance Member News interview, Council Member Pat Levitt discusses the communication gap between child development researchers and the general public. Ultimately, the goal of researching the architecture of the brain is to show the causes of healthy and unhealthy development. Therefore, as Dr. Levitt states, "public policy and public awareness should be part of what scientists do regularly." Dr. Levitt also discusses his own efforts to improve public awareness of his research in the areas of autism and schizophrenia.

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