Closing the Science-Policy Gap
A Conversation with Pediatrician Jack P. Shonkoff
Abstract: The National Scientific Council on the Developing Child was founded to close the gap between what we know and what we do to promote the healthy development of young children. When scientific knowledge is ignored rather than used to inform early childhood policy and practices, our children pay a very high price. Council Chair Jack P. Shonkoff, M.D., discusses the goals of the Council and four key conclusions of science that can be used to guide policy: human development is as much a function of “nurture” as of “nature;” the essential influences on children’s development are their relationships with their caregivers; the development of intelligence, language, emotions, and social skills are highly interrelated; and programs informed by scientific knowledge about child development can pay important dividends for the children and for society.
Jack P. Shonkoff, M.D., chairs the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child. Dr. Shonkoff is also Director of the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University and the Julius B. Richmond FAMRI Professor of Child Health and Development at the Harvard School of Public Health and Harvard Graduate School of Education. He is a Board-certified pediatrician whose work focuses on early childhood health and development and the interactions among research, policy, and practice. He also chaired the Committee on Integrating the Science of Early Childhood Development for the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences, and co-edited its final report, From Neurons to Neighborhoods: The Science of Early Childhood Development.
Jack Shonkoff isn’t easily flustered. His years as an academic dean and pediatrician serve to temper his responses. But get him started on the priority this nation places on its children and his exasperation shows. “The bottom line,” he says, “is that there is an unacceptably wide gap between what we know and what we do to promote the healthy development of young children.” It surely doesn’t have to be this way. “At a time when scientific advances could be used to inform more enlightened policy and strengthen early childhood practices,” he says, “knowledge is frequently dismissed or ignored—and our children are paying a very high price.”
And therein rests the greatest challenge—and a uniquely promising opportunity—for members of the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, which was launched in 2003 under the chairmanship of Shonkoff. With expertise bridging neuroscience, developmental psychology, the social sciences, and more, the Council members are anchored at the frontier of exciting research on the human brain and early development; and their involvement will assure that the Council’s work is grounded firmly in state-of-the-art science. Together, these experts share Shonkoff’s commitment to narrowing—and, with luck, closing—the troubling gap that today divides scientific knowledge from wise policy and effective practices.
The Council will pursue several complementary goals. To begin with, it intends to increase the priority and visibility of research about early childhood development—educating opinion leaders and the general public to help shape more effective policies as they relate to children and the many community influences that nurture them. Similarly, Shonkoff says, “We want to establish the Council as a resource for credible, objective, peer-reviewed information.” In his view, the Council can occupy “an important niche as a respected and trusted group that is anchored to the highest standards of academic rigor and driven by science rather than a partisan agenda. To this end we view ourselves not as traditional advocates but as knowledge brokers.” And a related goal, says Shonkoff, is to help produce a new generation of “publicly literate scientists,” future leaders skilled at translating the latest science of child development into language both parents and policy makers can understand.
Building on a Strong Foundation
This promising initiative builds on years of hard work from two pioneering groups focused on the science of early childhood. The first, a special committee of the National Research Council (NRC) and Institute of Medicine (IOM), brought together 17 leading authorities on human development and neuroscience for an unprecedented review of the existing knowledge base on early childhood. For two and a half years, the group (formally named the Committee on Integrating the Science of Early Childhood Development) compiled, analyzed, and evaluated a massive body of scientific data about the first five years of life, with a special focus on the fascinating ways in which the young brain develops. Their effort culminated in the publication of From Neurons to Neighborhoods: The Science of Early Childhood Development (October 2000), whose unprecedented scope attracted impressive reviews and widespread accolades.
For information about commonly used terms in Council publications, see Definitions.