A new study links doing one's homework, being interested and behaving responsibly in high school to better academic and career success as many as 50 years later. This effect, reported in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, holds true even after accounting for parental income, IQ and other factors known to influence achievement, researchers report.
The study analyzed decades of data collected by the American Institutes for Research beginning in 1960 and continuing to the present. The original data set included more than 370,000 students. High school participants were originally tested on academic, cognitive and behavioral characteristics in 1960 and also responded to follow-up surveys in later years. The new analysis looked at the initial student tests and their responses 11 years and 50 years later.
Of the 1,952 participants randomly selected from those who responded to surveys 50 years later, "those who showed more interest in high school and had higher writing skills reported earning higher incomes," said Spengler, who led the study. "They also tended to have higher occupational prestige than their peers when they showed responsible behaviors as a student." This was in addition to the gains associated with IQ, family income and personality traits such as conscientiousness, she said.
https://phys.org/news/2018-02-links-responsible-behavior-high-school.html
[Also Covered By]:
Behavior in high school predicts income and occupational success later in life
American Psychological Association
[Source]: University of Illinois
The paper "How you behave in school predicts life success above and beyond family background, broad traits, and cognitive ability" is available online and from the U. of I. News Bureau. DOI
Has your experience been as described ??
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:32PM (8 children)
I thought we were all supposed to drop out of high school to get rich.
(Score: 4, Funny) by bob_super on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:03PM (1 child)
Shows that you then had to drop out responsibly and politely, with a well-written F-U-All letter.
That's gonna be tough for the current generation to do, unless a 4-misspelled words Instagram post with a Grumpy Cat Meme, an eggplant emoji (gun emoji optional), turns out to be considered polite and responsible communication 50 years from now.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:54PM
Well, also consider the audience.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @01:04AM (5 children)
Our school system is an abomination and favors rote memorization over actual understanding of the material. You won't automatically get rich if you drop-out, but it's also a fallacy that our society automatically assumes that anyone not 'educated' in a high school must be uneducated; it depends entirely on the person and how motivated they are to learn using alternate methods.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:00AM (2 children)
It was my impression that our schools are in place to teach subordination. Take orders gracefully. Be a sheep.
But the wolves get fed.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:01AM (1 child)
Well, all that, but important part is: If you learn to not lose your head, be patient and endure everything, while functioning and delivering on school's demands, then it means you have a perseverance, discipline and flexibility, as well as tolerance to stress. Now, all you need to have for outstanding success is that all of the previously said hasn't numbed you into lack of criticism and low-profile type behavior habit. That is a final test. But even if you become and remain a mediocre, you'll still be ahead of majority and score a well paying job at those who came out unscathed.
Besides, memorizing and subordination are vastly underrated.
Understanding without memorizing is just entertainment, memorizing without understanding is mere recording, only memorizing and understanding is knowledge. Preferably, school needs to give you ability to access your internal "recordings", analyze them, understand their meaning, and expand them with your understanding, so that you can not only reproduce the original, but also explain it.
All non-trivial human endeavors are based on subordination. There is no good leader who never had been a subordinate. (Memorized) memories of an former subordinate is what gives a leader an in-depth insight into how organization functions, what it can, and what it cannot do.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 04 2018, @12:57PM
No one advocates never memorizing anything; you'd have nothing to work with if you did such a thing. The point is that schools currently focus far too much (almost entirely) on rote memorization.
But schools should never teach people to have a slave mentality, as they tend to do now. People should always be able to use their critical thinking skills and question authority.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:17PM (1 child)
So what you are saying is that the school system is very reflective of both the interview process and work in general?
I think that is the best way to prepare students for their future life.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 04 2018, @01:00PM
Well, it doesn't make for a very healthy society at all when most people have almost no critical thinking skills whatsoever. Who knows how much innovations we are missing out on by having such a disastrous school system, or how much better our political system would be if people could think for themselves. Maybe instead of forcing people to adapt to draconian workplaces, we should fix the workplaces.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:36PM (16 children)
That's the difference in IQ that results from an enriched education
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:44PM (12 children)
Elitist liberal propaganda!
Y'know, I wonder if the anti-education thing was a massive troll attempt to get people to voluntarily dumb themselves own.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:33PM (11 children)
Anti-education is to get people to vote for a particular political party.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:43PM (10 children)
FTFY. Higher ed in the west is so overwhelmingly far-left that it can't be honestly looked at as anything other than paying to be indoctrinated anymore.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:45PM (6 children)
Or your so far right that Bush and Reagan look like socialists to you.
I think that is just as likely an explanation slugger.
(Score: 4, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday February 28 2018, @11:36PM (5 children)
You're an absolute moron then or you've never listened to a word I've said. I am not in any way, shape, or form "right-wing".
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @11:40PM (4 children)
Paging aristarchus... Aristarchus, we need you at comment #645494
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:00AM (2 children)
Oh that'll be fair and balanced. Nice guy, but has his biases like anyone else.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @02:14AM (1 child)
Says the neo nazi wannabe.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:19AM
How dare you call him a wannabe!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:12AM
That there is a portion of the left that have decided liberty is a bad thing and declared anyone that believes in it to be "right-wing" does not make it so. They're a minority and do not get to define the terms we all use.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:46PM (2 children)
not true if you don't pick such places
the problem is that it seems the one with the most success stories are far left. the conservative ones don't seem to be as large or have as many success stories.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday February 28 2018, @11:34PM (1 child)
You're aware that the far-left-ization of our higher ed system is not something that's been going on forever, yes? Thus anything outside the time since its emergence can have nothing to do with success or failure of a particular institution.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @05:21PM
well... i do know that 'liberal studies' wasn't supposed to be meant as 'sjw training'. liberal education has nothing to do with politics, but has been subversed by some ignorant loudmouths.
not saying you are. but the message of ignorance is very loud on some popular news sites that do not care about the intended meaning. that is probably a benefit to them to be wrong and i doubt they themselves are ignorant of what they are claiming.
both sides do it so dont get me wrong about it.
still if someone really cares about what the political leaning is they should try to figure that out before going or be ok as part of a group that might be able to change the place if they are ok with being upset by what everyone else around them is doing.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:52PM
Not the education which makes them successful 50 years on...
It is the ability to wade their way through pointless bullshit, social interactions, makework, and the plethora of mental health issues that may result, and continue to produce results which, for a statistically sufficient portion to make this study's point, succeed in life.
I would just like to point out if this is a study providing evidence 50 years later, that it only applied to the greybeards amongst us, and the millenials parents, and may not still apply to the what passes for the 'modern civilized world', which seems neither modern, nor civilized in comparison, although certainly with many technical advancements written about, some of which have been implemented, some of which are simply documented.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:02PM
20 points is the high estimate for a four-year degree and it is not necessarily causative. IIRC the more conservative range is between 1-3 points per year, with five points being the highest estimate.
This is at least according to Bryan Caplan, but he wrote a book on arguing against most higher education so feel free to be more skeptical.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:15AM
MDC - can you cite this? A good source showing expected +20 points for enriched education might be enough for me to convince a loved one that it's best for a child who really does need something to change.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:45PM (4 children)
Cool, never would have guessed that how well people do in an academic environment is a predictor for how well those people do in an academic environment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:57PM (3 children)
You forgot the "better academic and career success. Did you skip out a lot during high school?
(Score: 2) by Snow on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:09PM (1 child)
I skipped my VB programming class so much that when the vice-principal would look for people skipping, he would pass right by me because I was ALWAYS in the cafeteria at that time. I think I went to like 5 classes, and was able to complete the coursework in those 5 classes (the entire course was essentially to code a blackjack game).
Today, I am moderately successful. I'm comfortable -- not rich, not poor. I have a pretty good job that has almost no chance for promotion/advancement with a good company.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:46PM
Responsibility doesn't mean doing what you're told, just owning your actions and the consequences. In your case it kept your mind from being poisoned, so a good consequence.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:49PM
Do you understand the word "and"?
Saying that a person is successful in "academics and [their] career" means that both of the following are statements true:
(a) that the person is successful in academics, and
(b) that the person is successful in their career.
(a) is a tautology because the premise was that the person does well in academics.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Thexalon on Wednesday February 28 2018, @07:53PM (1 child)
I would have never imagined that the kids who did well in school and went on to college are richer than the kids that got knocked up or dropped out or got hooked on addictive drugs. I'm glad that got cleared up.
That said, there are definitely exceptions: For instance, one fairly well-known figure basically coasted through his youth, had serious drinking problems and got hooked on cocaine at one point, and he ended up being president of the US. Meanwhile, my smartest and most responsible classmate was, last I checked, working as a medical secretary, because she was speaking English as her fourth language, and her parents had left behind most of their wealth and their successful careers behind when they left Bosnia.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:04AM
Unfortunately its unclear from all the linked articles (unless I missed it?) how
included or excluded factors such as
I would bet they included factors like that, it seems kinda obvious, then again they're academics, so ...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by crafoo on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:11PM (5 children)
Seems reasonable. Motivation, responsibility, and mental intensity are 100% what is required to be successful. Not necessarily a stable home life. Not intelligence. Not race. Not sex.
When society tells one of the sexes that they don't have to be responsible and that if something bad happens the government should step in and settle things for them: that's taking their responsibility away. That kills their chances at success. If you don't learn to be responsible and to look to others to fulfill that you're going to have a hard time.
When society tells a certain class of people to not try, the deck is stacked against them and it's predetermined they will lose: that kills motivation. Effort is required but if we tell people don't put in effort, you're going to lose anyway. Bad times.
When society tells young children rote memorization, practice, and core skills are not important. Don't learn these things. You can save the world by writing shitty javascript and "raising awareness of critical social issues": that kills mental intensity. They do not develop the ability to learn something difficult. They do not understand what is required to do so and become angry it isn't in the same class of activity as posting on twitter and shopping on amazon.
Why are we actively destroying our children's chances of success through poor societal normals?
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:31PM (1 child)
Examples? Seriously, there's the pre-internet and post-internet bodies of knowledge that have become more/less difficult/irrelevant, so being on the cusp it can be difficult to tell the difference.
Difficult:
Pre-internet: Communications logistics/cost management
Post-internet: Standing out on Youtube or the Internet enough to make money from it
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:37PM
Pre-Internet, it was also difficult to stand out on YouTube or the Internet enough to make money from it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:46PM
Better to tell them to try. That they can accomplish anything they set their mind to.
And then take away their opportunities to do so.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:48PM
Add Insight to the list. If you don't understand the steps necessary to succeed, any success really is luck like the failures of the world keep saying.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @01:13AM
Yes, because rote memorization - rather than deep understanding - makes for a good education. No. That's exactly the problem with our abysmal school system and it always has before. Before the inevitable 'So you don't want anyone to know any facts whatsoever?' straw man is used, I should note that that I merely think a great amount of emphasis needs to be placed on leading people to an understanding of the material rather than just memorizing facts about it. It would be nice if math classes, for instance, didn't just have people memorize equations and patterns so they could solve trivial problems on busywork and tests.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:15PM (9 children)
High school was of little interest because it was too slow and there were too many bullshit requirements. Night classes at a community college helped, but I mainly coasted through high school with decent enough grades while trying not to kill myself out of boredom.
Thankfully, "higher writing skills" were not necessary for a STEM PhD. I'd guess that many here have similar stories since many in STEM fields are about as well-rounded as a triangle.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:41PM (2 children)
About writing skills. I'll never have a PhD, but writing skills are not necessary to get through school (way back in the day) if you could complete work. And to get a good job, if you could actually code and communicate sufficiently well. As a company grows and gets acquired by a company far away, and you get email in the mid 1980's, then you begin to realize the importance of being able to express yourself concisely and clearly in writing. Especially on complex technical subjects. Such as explaining how to perversely use exceptions on each iteration to transform a recursive function into an iterative one.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:47PM (1 child)
Abusing Python exceptions to turn a recursive function iterative [ycombinator.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday February 28 2018, @09:36PM
Yep, just what I was thinking of. :-)
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @08:44PM (4 children)
Some time in the middle 2000s, MIT began putting so much emphasis on "higher writing skills", communication, arts, and "well-roundedness", that you'd have been fucked. They should really change the name to MITH: Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Humanities.
Supposedly, this is to foster better leaders within the tech industry, but I think it just turns the tech-savvy youth into better bullshitters.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Thexalon on Wednesday February 28 2018, @09:08PM (3 children)
I'm guessing you wanted to go there and didn't get in because your verbal and non-STEM scores weren't so good.
But I'm going to agree with MIT on this one: Good verbal skills and a wide range of knowledge definitely helps people working in technology. Some of the examples of why it matters:
- You need to be able to understand why you're building the thing you're being asked to build, in order to design it properly.
- You need to be able to make suggestions of why something else you could build might be better.
- You need to be able to explain what you've built to STEM colleagues who are going to need to use it.
- You also need to be able to explain your work to people with little-to-no STEM background.
- If you start getting to the point where you're supervising or mentoring other people, you need to be skilled at reading moods and handling their psychology well.
- If you start getting further up in the hierarchies, you'll need to develop good schmoozing skills. I know you probably don't like that, but welcome to how management works.
And if you look at the really celebrated scientists out there, you'll notice they can speak and write well. Because it's part of the job.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @09:26PM
Very bad.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:36PM (1 child)
"And if you look at the really celebrated scientists out there, you'll notice they can speak and write well."
There's a heavy dose of selection bias there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:29AM
> There's a heavy dose of selection bias there.
Right. The scientists who can speak and write well are selected for those traits from the pool of scientists who are smart ambitious and lucky enough.
That's exactly the point.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @01:20AM
NCLB simply exacerbated a problem that already existed. A preference for rote memorization over understanding has always been an issue with our school system.
I would think being interested in learning would be the real factor in determining whether someone is successful later on, rather than just the tendency to complete mindless homework and tests that require only rote memorization to solve.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Wednesday February 28 2018, @09:05PM
This explains a lot, actually. I was thinking that responsible behavior *now* would be enough, but it turns out I was not exactly right.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Provocateur on Wednesday February 28 2018, @09:59PM (2 children)
Wait. Do I have to wait FIFTY years to get similar results?
I was hoping to blame heredity i.e. bad jeans, instead of environment
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:32PM
Your father's bad jeans constricted his testicles, making you the product of damaged sperm.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:06AM
Hipster jeans, not even once.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @10:46PM (6 children)
I spent the entirety of my high school years in the library and the computer lab, studying. As a teenager, I had no life, no friends, and no job. As a adult, I still have no life, no friends, and no job. Why do you suppose that is? Oh that's right. All you motherfucking asshole shitheads lied about jobs for computer programmers. There aren't any jobs. There never were any jobs. You are all fucking liars.
I still code, for what it's worth, which is absolutely nothing. There aren't any six-figure coding jobs out there like you fuckers are always spreading rumors about. There aren't even any five-figure coding jobs. There are absolutely no coding jobs at all.
So fuck you and fuck your tech industry hoax, the greatest education scam in history. I was an A student for nothing, and I might as well have skipped school and started my life in poverty so much sooner, without the false hope of your goddamned fucking tech jobs hoax.
Fuck you all to hell.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @11:00PM
However, it's time to make a change in your life.
Move to another place on the planet.
Learn a new skill.
Find productive work you don't mind doing; find people with whom you like to collaborate.
Life is a prison, but in our modern world, life is largely a prison of your own making.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @11:53PM
Go to a college with a Software Engineering degree or go start an eBay store. Find some stuff listed for free off Craigslist and list it on eBay. There are tons of ways to make a living without needing an extensive education or a large investment to get started. Go listen to side hustling podcasts for more ideas. Dog sitting. AirBnb. Renting out your car (not taxi/ride sharing services). Picking up trash from parking lots for 30 an hour (go talk to the stores and ask for a trial period to become their lot cleaner). Etc...
Your problem is your attitude.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @05:30AM (3 children)
I got laid off my programming job 1 week ago (plus 2 weeks advance "notice" before that), and I just got a new job at a raise for close to $150,000.
This seems like I am posting to rub salt in the wound, but I promise I am not. I put it out there as proof that software jobs really are out there, but you do have to:
1) Live in an area where there is a sizable software or IT services industry
2) Have in-demand (current, but not necessarily cutting edge) skills
3) Be able to verbally explain the value you bring as an employee
4) Have an employment record that shows strong (and ideally increasing) responsibility
You can turn it around and join the programming world, but only if you can give employers what they are looking for.
And you have to be willing to live where the jobs are.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:02AM (2 children)
Have fun with your insanely expensive cost of living, or at least in most cases. In a world where it's possible to work remotely, this is fucking inexcusable.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:49PM (1 child)
It's a different set of tradeoffs, remote versus onsite.
Remote work tends to be a career dead end. If you are OK with never advancing beyond programmer individual contributor, this may be fine.
Customer interaction is pretty hard to do remotely as a general rule too. On the plus side, if you enjoy living off the beaten path, you can as a remote worker. You just need internet access.
On the minus side, if your work can be done remotely, then it can be done by anyone in the world that speaks your boss's language. You are competing with the entire world, and this tends to lower your wage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 04 2018, @01:03PM
The problem is that, once you do the math, you'll often find that it's not worth living in places like Silicone Valley at all, even if the job appears to pay an insane amount.
Maybe you're not very good at your job then. Of course, most employees are bad at telling if someone is good at their job, so they'd probably happily replace a good employee with some random fool in India.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @12:28AM (1 child)
Scientists surprised by common sense, once again. Public questions time and money spent.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:00AM
In other news, more misleading science reporting from the media that idiots in the general public will swallow up and deem "common sense".