Does childhood personality predict longevity?

“In contrast to these recent studies, the well-known Terman Study of gifted individuals found that a childhood measure of cheerfulness (rated by parents and teachers) was associated with earlier death (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“For example, research drawn from the Terman Longitudinal Study showed that children who were more conscientious tended to live longer (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“At the same time, evolutionary conceptions of personality may also suggest what kinds of basic variations to expect in psychological individuality (Gangestad & Simp-”

“Friedman et al. (1993) first identified conscientiousness as a predictor of longevity.”

“Individuals high in Conscientiousness tend to die earlier (Friedman et al., 1993); thus, cross-sectional increases in Conscientiousness could occur because at older ages, fewer lowConscientiousness individuals are available as participants.”

“Fo re xample, Conscientiousness scores correlate positively with long-term career success (Judge, Higgins, Thoresen, & Barrick, 1999), college retention (Tross, Harper, Osher, & Kneidinger, 2000), marital stability (Kelly & Conley, 1987; Tucker, Kressin, Spiro, & Ruscio, 1998), healthy lifestyle behaviors (Booth-Kewle…”

“... LOT Physical symptoms CS −.21 LOT Life Orientation Test (Scheier and Carver [18]), LOT-R Life Orientation Test-Revised (Scheier et al. [19]), FLOT French life orientation test (Allison et al. [109]), CLOT Chinese life orientation test (Lai et al. [110]); ASQ Attributional Style Questionnaire (Peterson et al. [21])…”

“This was for instance the case with the above-mentioned study that observed greater mortality among cheerful people, the word 'cheerfulness' being used for a happy-go-lucky attitude (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“…intense positive affect has psychological costs (Diener, Colvin, Pavot, & Allman, 1991), extremely cheerful people engage in riskier behaviors (Martin et al., 2002) and live shorter lives (Friedman et al., 1993), and extremely happy people earn lower salaries (Oishi, Diener, & Lucas, 2007).”

“Longevity is determined by length of life in years, and is generally verified from vital records or familial report (e.g., Brown, Butow, Culjak, Coates, & Dunn, 2000; Friedman et al., 1993; Wingard, Berkman, & Brand, 1994).”

“It is also associated with other important outcomes, such as children’s grades in school, health behaviors, and longevity (Bogg & Roberts, 2004; Friedman et al., 1993; Poropat, 2014).”

“Extensive research following up the initial startling finding of two decades ago (Friedman et al. 1993) that childhood conscientiousness is a strong predictor of longevity has revealed that conscientiousness is a very strong and reliable lifelong predictor of healthy pathways and of health and…”

“In addition to neuroticism, and contrary to expectations, cheerfulness was related to greater mortality risk (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“, 2006), and numerous other populations (Pressman & Cohen, 2005), a longitudinal study of the intellectually gifted participants in the Terman project showed that childhood cheerfulness rated by teachers and parents was inversely associated with risk of mortality (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“Friedman et al. (1993) found that childhood conscientiousness predicted longevity and Friedman et al. (1995) showed that this was partly accounted for by its effect on smoking and alcohol use; that is, conscientious children were less likely to become heavy smokers and drinkers.”

“For example: (1) Extraverts are more likely than Introverts to use a strategy reflecting less restricted sexuality (Eysenck, 1976); (2) Neuroticism is correlated with behavioral inhibition and avoidance behavior (MacDonald, 1995); (3) Conscientiousness relates to the use of long-term strategies, desire for control, de…”

“Optimism has thus even been implicated as a mortality-risk: Friedman et al.’s (1993) longitudinal research suggested that ‘cheerful’ children (optimism plus”

“In a sample of cognitively gifted Californians, Friedman et al. [17] found that children who were rated by their parents and teachers as being more conscientious tended to live longer, even when controlling for gender and SES.”

“For example, Friedman and his colleagues (e.g., Friedman et al., 1993, 1995 ) demonstrated that childhood Conscientiousness is predictive of longevity.”

“The relationship did not hold for men, although Friedman et al. (1993), who used a data set from a seven-decade longitudinal study begun in 1921 by L. M. Terman (Terman & Oden, 1947), reported that people (especially men) who were conscientious as children lived longer, whereas those who were…”

“Personality traits have emerged as important predictors of allcause mortality (Friedman, 2000; Friedman et al., 1993; Maier & Smith, 1999).”

“(13), even though their study did not use a standard measure of FFM Conscientiousness.”

“Friedman and colleagues showed that conscientiousness in childhood was a good predictor of life-span mortality risk (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“Finally, some studies have shown that humour may even have detrimental effects on stress and depression (Dorz, Novara, Sica, & Sanavio, 2003), and that high cheerfulness at the age of 12 is associated with high mortality rates (Friedman et al., 1993), perhaps due to lower levels of concern about health risks.”

“This task is further complicated as, with the exception of three studies (6,13,18), none had follow-up periods of 7 years and only two studies (14,10) included subjects that varied widely in age.”

“In addition, new topics based in mainstream personality theory have emerged as potentially important influences on health, such as the role of conscientiousness (Friedman et al. 1993).”

“…disorganized, irresponsible, and undisciplined) is related to negative health behaviors (e.g., smoking, drinking, poor diet, and lack of exercise; Friedman et al., 1993; Hampson, Goldberg, Vogt, & Dubanoski, 2007; Roberts, Kuncel, Shiner, Caspi, & Goldberg, 2007) and negative health outcomes…”

“Prior studies with the full Terman sample have examined the relation between adult personality and mortality risk and have found a strong protective effect of conscientiousness (Friedman et al., 1993; Martin & Friedman, 2000; Martin et al., 2007).”

“However, the present BLSA study and the Terman study (33) found no such association.”

“Childhood Conscientiousness was predictive of greater longevity for both men and women (more strongly for men than women), permanence of mood showed some evidence of being protective for men, and childhood cheerfulness was predictive of a shorter life span (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“Measured in childhood, the personality traits of conscientiousness, lack of cheerfulness, and permanence of mood (for men only on this trait) were associated with longer lives (7, 8).”

“One recent report suggested that level of conscientiousness in childhood predicts survival in middle to old age (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“The first finding is deceptively simple: Conscientiousness predicts longevity ( Friedman et al., 1993 ).”

“Measures of conscientiousness have been found to predict longevity in initially healthy samples and survival among persons with established disease [63–68].”

“…influence health and longevity, in part through their effect on health behaviors, such as tobacco and alcohol consumption (Caspi et al., 1997; Friedman et al., 1993; Friedman, 2000; Hampson, Andrews, Barckley, Lichtenstein, & Lee, 2000; Martin & Friedman, 2000), and through their effect on…”

“Second, previous research has been predominantly mono-method, either relying exclusively on observer reports (Friedman et al., 1993) or self-reports (e.g. Weiss & Costa, 2005).”

“…(Tross, Harper, Osher, & Kneidinger, 2000), marital stability (Kelly & Conley, 1987; Tucker, Kressin, Spiro, & Ruscio, 1998), healthy lifestyle behaviors (Booth-Kewley & Vickers, 1994; Clark & Watson, 1999), longevity (Friedman et al., 1993), and even eating habits (Goldberg & Stycker, 2002).”

“level of intelligence, conscientiousness in childhood and in adulthood was associated with reduced risk of death (Friedman et al., 1993; Martin & Friedman, 2000).”

“, 1989), conscientiousness (Friedman et al., 1993), extraversion (Broadbent et al.”

“In keeping with the criteria for inclusion in the previous study (Friedman et al., 1993), those not of school age at the time of initial data collection (i.”

“After thousands of studies (well over 1,000 studies were published in the 1980s alone), such efforts collapsed as it became clear that much more needed to be known at a deeper level about the validity and conceptual basis of the personality constructs (including convergent and discriminant…”

“Findings linking conscientiousness and cheerfulness in children to mortality in adulthood suggest that personality in childhood can be powerfully indicative of later health, but these observations were made on a highly selected group of intellectually gifted children followed into later life (37).”

“Beginning with childhood, we first tested whether variables representing major dimensions of personality could predict longevity across the life-span (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“This is comparable to other work predicting late-life outcomes from childhood personality assessments (Friedman et al., 1993, 1995a, 1995b).”

“Such findings as the Seltzer and Jablon (1977) and Friedman et al. (1993) demonstrations, which show that longevity can be predicted successfully from army rank, even with socio-economic factors controlled, and from childhood personality, support the hypothesis of a healthy personality.”

“In recent years, personality variables have emerged in as important predictors of mortality (Friedman, 2000; Friedman et al., 1993).”

“For example, Friedman et al. (1993), using data from the Terman Life Cycle Study, reported that childhood conscientiousness predicted longevity and the magnitude of this effect (as a risk factor) was comparable to those from elevated serum cholesterol and systolic blood pressure levels in adulthood.”

“Through factor analysis, six different personality dimensions have previously been identified [42].”

“We created a scale of high energy and physical activity, involving preference for games requiring lots of exercise, preference for playing outdoors, and rated physical energy on a 1 to 13 scale (see Friedman et al., 1993 for further details of the ratings by parents and teachers).”

“Friedman et al. [ 2 ], using data from the Terman Life Cycle Study, reported that childhood conscientiousness predicted longevity and the magnitude of this effect (as a risk factor) was comparable to those from elevated serum cholesterol and systolic blood pressure levels in adulthood.”

“Measures of conscientiousness administered in childhood or adolescence, for instance, have been used to predict life experiences, such as divorce, earnings, and even longevity (e.g., Friedman et al., 1993).”

“... 1997), and also predict a wide range of outcomes including job performance, status, and satisfaction (Judge, Higgins, Thoreson, & Barrick, 1999), relationship satisfaction (Robins, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2000), divorce (Cramer, 1993), delinquency (Miller & Lynam, 2001), personality disorders (Widiger, Verheul, & van de…”

“…on health, reducing the risk of health conditions such as obesity and hypertension (Brummett et al., 2006; Goodwin & Friedman, 2006; Hampson et al., 2006), depression and anxiety (Kotov et al., 2010), and early mortality (Friedman et al., 1993, 1995; Hampson et al., 2006; Martin et al., 2007).”

“Through factor analysis, six different personality dimensions have previously been identified: cheerfulness (α = .52), conscientiousness (α = .76), high energy (α= .43), highmotivation/self esteem (α= .71), sociability (α= .65), and permanency of moods (single item) (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“As conscientiousness has been linked to better survival in observational studies [12, 44–47], better medication adherence may partly explain this association, particularly in patient samples where medication can play an important part in optimising secondary prevention of illness [46].”

“Those who dropped out do not differ in terms of income, education, and demographic factors (Sears, 1984), or psychological measures (Friedman et al., 1993).”

“A study by Friedman et al. (1993) showed that conscientiousness predicts longevity.”

“We selected these characteristics because each has an established link to morbidity and mortality (Friedman et al., 1993; Felitti et al., 1998; Atzmon et al., 2004; Hayward & Gorman, 2004; Case et al., 2005; Calvin et al., 2011).”

“As a result of these effects, poor self-regulation is a very strong, independent predictor of both disease-specific and overall mortality (Friedman et al., 1993; Kröz et al., 2011).”

“Extensive longitudinal studies over almost 70 years have shown that people who have relatively high levels of conscientiousness live longer than those with lower levels (Friedman et al., 1993, 1995).”

“Extensive research over the past two decades, following up on our initial finding that childhood conscientiousness predicts long life (Friedman et al., 1993), has revealed that conscientiousness is a very strong and reliable predictor of healthy pathways and of health and longevity (Friedman, Kern,…”