在养育孩子方面，每个父母的做法都不同。有的父母会学习别人的经验，看育儿书籍，有的是“散养”型，究竟哪种方式正确呢？英国科学家用70年的时间追踪了7万名孩子的一生，通过对比分析，他们揭示了影响孩子成功与否的很大一个因素。

通过回顾这项伟大的研究，科学记者海伦·皮尔森为我们分享了一些关于生活与好的养育方式的重要发现和简单真理。

演讲者：海伦·皮尔森(Helen Pearson)，世界领先的科学杂志《自然》杂志的主编，同时也是一名记者、作家和科学家。她的科普著作《生命计划》被《观察家报》评为年度最佳科学书籍，也是《经济学人》年度图书。

📃 演讲文本

Today I want to confess something to you, but first of all I'm going to ask you a couple of questions. How many people here have children? And how many of you are confident that you know how to bring up your children in exactly the right way?

今天我想跟你们坦白一些事情, 但是首先我将要问你们一些问题。在座的有多少已经有小孩了？你们中又有多少可以自信地说你知道如何完全正确地养育你的小孩？

OK, I don't see too many hands going up on that second one, and that's my confession, too. I've got three boys; they're three, nine and 12. And like you, and like most parents, the honest truth is I have pretty much no idea what I'm doing. I want them to be happy and healthy in their lives, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do to make sure they are happy and healthy.

好的，我看第二个问题没有多少人举手, 而这也是我要坦白的。我有三个儿子, 他们分别是3岁、9岁和12岁。就像你，就像大多数父母一样, 老实说我真的不知道我在做什么。我希望他们生活得健康、快乐，但是我不知道我应该怎么做才能确保他们健康快乐。

There's so many books offering all kinds of conflicting advice, it can be really overwhelming. So I've spent most of their lives just making it up as I go along. However, something changed me a few years ago, when I came across a little secret that we have in Britain.

市面上有很多提供各种互相矛盾的建议的书籍，真的是令人不知所措。所以大多数时间我都是边摸索边抚养他们的。然而，几年前的一些事改变了我，那时我无意间发现了我们英国的一个小秘密。

It's helped me become more confident about how I bring up my own children, and it's revealed a lot about how we as a society can help all children. I want to share that secret with you today.

它使我对于如何养育小孩有了更多的自信，它还揭露了作为一个社会整体，我们该如何帮助所有的小孩。今天我想跟你们分享这个秘密。

For the last 70 years, scientists in Britain have been following thousands of children through their lives as part of an incredible scientific study. There's nothing quite like it anywhere else in the world.

在过去70年里，英国科学家跟踪调查了成千上万小孩子的一生作为一项惊人的科学研究的一部分。这世上没有另外一件像这样的事情了。

Collecting information on thousands of children is a really powerful thing to do, because it means we can compare the ones who say, do well at school or end up healthy or happy or wealthy as adults, and the ones who struggle much more, and then we can sift through all the information we've collected and try to work out why their lives turned out different.

收集成千上万的小孩子的信息真的是一件很厉害的事，因为这意味着我们可以将那些在学校表现好或者成年后变得健康、快乐或富有的小孩跟那些苦苦挣扎的小孩进行对比，然后从收集到的信息中进行筛选，试着去找出为什么他们的生活会变得大不相同。

This British study -- it's actually a kind of crazy story. So it all starts back in 1946, just a few months after the end of the war, when scientists wanted to know what it was like for a woman to have a baby at the time. They carried out this huge survey of mothers and ended up recording the birth of nearly every baby born in England, Scotland and Wales in one week.

这一项英国的研究—— 事实上是一个疯狂的故事。它最初开始于1946年，也就在二战结束后的几个月当时科学家想要知道在当时一个妇女有了小孩会是怎样的。他们对妈妈们进行了这项巨大的调查并最终纪录下了几乎所有在一个星期内出生在英格兰、苏格兰和威尔士的小孩。

That was nearly 14,000 babies. The questions they asked these women are very different than the ones we might ask today. They sound really old-fashioned now. They asked them things like, "During pregnancy, did you get your full extra ration of a pint of milk a day?" "How much did you spend on smocks, corsets, nightdresses, knickers and brassieres?" And this is my favorite one: "Who looked after your husband while you were in bed with this baby?"

那是将近一万四千个小孩。他们当时问这些妇女的问题跟我们今天要问的问题大不相同。这些问题现在看起来真的很守旧。他们问的问题是像这样的： “在怀孕期间你是否每天都得到了额外配给的一品脱牛奶？” “你在罩衫、紧身内衣、睡衣、短裤以及胸罩上花了多少钱？” 而我最喜欢的是这一个：“你跟小孩在床上的时候，谁照顾你丈夫？”

Now, this wartime study actually ended up being so successful that scientists did it again. They recorded the births of thousands of babies born in 1958 and thousands more in 1970. They did it again in the early 1990s, and again at the turn of the millennium.

这项战争时代的研究最终非常成功，科学家后来又重新进行了这项研究。他们纪录下了成千上万的出生于1958年的小孩并且纪录下了更多出生于 1970年的小孩。他们在上世纪90年代早期又做了一次，然后在千禧年前后又做了一次。

加拿大曼省留学生移民项目

移民政策好英语门槛低

项目周期短省时省学费

点击图片了解详情

Altogether, more than 70,000 children have been involved in these studies across those five generations. They're called the British birth cohorts, and scientists have gone back and recorded more information on all of these people every few years ever since.

总共有超过七万个小孩参与到了这项研究中来，横跨了五代人。他们被称为英国出生组群。科学家每隔几年会重访所有这些人并收集纪录下更多的信息。

The amount of information that's now been collected on these people is just completely mind-boggling. It includes thousands of paper questionnaires and terabytes' worth of computer data. Scientists have also built up a huge bank of tissue samples, which includes locks of hair, nail clippings, baby teeth and DNA.

从这些人那里收集到的信息总量，是完全不可想像的。它包含了数千份的调查问卷，和巨量的电脑数据。科学家还建立了个巨大的标本数据库，里面存有头发、指甲、婴儿的牙齿以及DNA。

They've even collected 9,000 placentas from some of the births, which are now pickled in plastic buckets in a secure storage warehouse. This whole project has become unique -- so, no other country in the world is tracking generations of children in quite this detail. These are some of the best-studied people on the planet, and the data has become incredibly valuable for scientists, generating well over 6,000 academic papers and books.

他们从一些分娩中收集了9000个胎盘，这些胎盘现都储存塑料桶里，存在个安全的储存室中。这整个项目是独一无二的—— 这世上没有任何其它国家这么细致地对几代小孩进行跟踪调查。这是一些这个星球上被研究得最透彻的人，这些数据对科学家来说有无可估量的价值，由此产生了超过6000篇的学术论文和书籍。

But today I want to focus on just one finding -- perhaps the most important discovery to come from this remarkable study. And it's also the one that spoke to me personally, because it's about how to use science to do the best for our children.

但是今天，我要关注的只是其中的一项发现—— 也许是这个伟大研究里最重要的发现，它对于我个人来说也是挺有意义的，因为它是关于如何利用科学去为孩子们做到最好的。

So, let's get the bad news out of the way first. Perhaps the biggest message from this remarkable study is this: don't be born into poverty or into disadvantage, because if you are, you're far more likely to walk a difficult path in life.

首先我们来说一说坏消息。也许这个伟大研究发出的最大的消息就是：不要出生在贫穷落后的家庭，因为如果你出身不好，你就更有可能走上一条艰难的人生道路。

Many children in this study were born into poor families or into working-class families that had cramped homes or other problems, and it's clear now that those disadvantaged children have been more likely to struggle on almost every score. They've been more likely to do worse at school, to end up with worse jobs and to earn less money.

这个研究中的许多小孩都出生在住在狭窄的房子里，或者有其它各种问题的贫困家庭或工人阶级家庭，现在很清楚的一点是这些处于劣势的小孩更有可能在几乎每个方面中挣扎。他们可能在学校表现得更糟糕，最终找一份更糟糕的工作并赚更少的钱。

Now, maybe that sounds really obvious, but some of the results have been really surprising, so children who had a tough start in life are also more likely to end up unhealthy as adults. They're more likely to be overweight, to have high blood pressure, and then decades down the line, more likely to have a failing memory, poor health and even to die earlier.

也许这些听起来像是明摆的事，但是也有一些结果令人很吃惊，那些人生的起点就很艰苦的小孩也更可能在成年后身体没有那么健康。他们更可能超重，患上高血压，然后几十年后，更有可能记忆衰退、身体不佳甚至死得更早。

Now, I talked about what happens later, but some of these differences emerge at a really shockingly early age. In one study, children who were growing up in poverty were almost a year behind the richer children on educational tests, and that was by the age of just three.

我上面谈到的都是一些后期的影响，但是有一些差异是在一个令人震惊的早期就显现出来的。在其中的一个研究中，贫困家庭长大的小孩在教育测试上要比富裕家庭的小孩落后一年，而这还只是在他们3岁的时候。

These types of differences have been found again and again across the generations. It means that our early circumstances have a profound influence on the way that the rest of our lives play out. And working out why that is is one of the most difficult questions that we face today.

这种的差异在几代人之间一次又一次的被发现。这意味着我们早期的生活环境对我们的余生有着更深远的影响。而找出这其中的原因, 是我们今天所面对的最困难的问题之一。

So there we have it. The first lesson for successful life, everyone, is this: choose your parents very carefully.

我们现在已经有答案了。各位，获得成功人生的第一堂课是：小心地选择你的父母。

Don't be born into a poor family or into a struggling family. Now, I'm sure you can see the small problem here. We can't choose our parents or how much they earn, but this British study has also struck a real note of optimism by showing that not everyone who has a disadvantaged start ends up in difficult circumstances.

不要出生在一个贫困的家庭。我敢肯定你们可以看出这里的一个小问题，那就是我们不能选择父母或者他们的收入水平，但这项英国的研究通过展现不是所有出身卑微的人最终都陷入困境，因此带来了希望。

As you know, many people have a tough start in life, but they end up doing very well on some measure nevertheless, and this study starts to explain how.

正如你所知道的，很多人出身贫苦，然而最终在某些程度上来说过得也不错，而这个研究将要解释如何实现这个。

全美唯一保送普渡大学的项目

先在国内修线上学分课

安全又方便！

入学难度大大降低！

So the second lesson is this: parents really matter. In this study, children who had engaged, interested parents, ones who had ambition for their future, were more likely to escape from a difficult start. It seems that parents and what they do are really, really important, especially in the first few years of life.

所以第二课是：父母真的很重要。在这项研究中，那些拥有负责任、关心自己的父母的小孩会对未来有野心，并更可能从贫困的生活中逃离出来。看来父母以及他们的行为真的真的很重要，尤其是在孩子刚出生到几岁大这段时间。

Let me give you an example of that. In one study, scientists looked at about 17,000 children who were born in 1970. They sifted all the mountains of data that they had collected to try to work out what allowed the children who'd had a difficult start in life to go on and do well at school nevertheless.

让我来举个例子。在一个研究中，科学家调查了大约一万七千个出生在1970年的小孩。他们筛选了收集到的海量信息，试图去找出是什么让这些出身贫苦的小孩能够坚持下去并在学校表现出色。

In other words, which ones beat the odds. The data showed that what mattered more than anything else was parents. Having engaged, interested parents in those first few years of life was strongly linked to children going on to do well at school later on. In fact, quite small things that parents do are associated with good outcomes for children.

换句话说，是什么让他们打败命运的魔咒。数据显示，比任何事情都重要的就是父母从小拥有一个负责任、关心孩子的父母和孩子之后在学校表现好有很强的联系。事实上，父母做的一些很小的事就能对小孩产生一些好的影响。

Talking and listening to a child, responding to them warmly, teaching them their letters and numbers, taking them on trips and visits. Reading to children every day seems to be really important, too.

倾听他们说的，亲切地回应他们，教他们字母和数字，带他们去旅行。每天为孩子们朗读故事似乎也很重要。

So in one study, children whose parents were reading to them daily when they were five and then showing an interest in their education at the age of 10, were significantly less likely to be in poverty at the age of 30 than those whose parents weren't doing those things.

因此在一个研究中，那些父母在孩子五岁时每天为他们朗读故事，然后在孩子十岁时关心他们的教育的小孩们在30岁的时候变得贫穷的可能性明显比那些父母没有那样去做的小孩要少得多。

Now, there are huge challenges with interpreting this type of science. These studies show that certain things that parents do are correlated with good outcomes for children, but we don't necessarily know those behaviors caused the good outcomes, or whether some other factor is getting in the way. For example, we have to take genes into account, and that's a whole other talk in itself.

现在，在解释这门科学上面临很大的挑战。这些研究表明父母做的某些事情跟孩子以后能有一个好的结果是相关联的，但是我们未必知道是这些行为导致了好的结果或者是否还有其它的因素在妨碍这种结果。例如，我们需要也考虑基因的影响，但这个它本身就值得另外一个演讲。

But scientists working with this British study are working really hard to get at causes, and this is one study I particularly love. In this one, they looked at the bedtime routines of about 10,000 children born at the turn of the millennium.

进行这项英国研究的科学家很努力地在寻找原因，而这也是我个人特别喜爱的一个研究。在这个研究中，他们观察了大约一万个出生在千禧年的小孩的睡眠时间规律。

Were the children going to bed at regular times, or did they go to bed at different times during the week? The data showed that those children who were going to bed at different times were more likely to have behavioral problems, and then those that switched to having regular bedtimes often showed an improvement in behavior, and that was really crucial, because it suggested it was the bedtime routines that were really helping things get better for those kids.

这些孩子是在固定的时间睡觉，还是在一星期中每天的睡眠时间都不一样？数据显示那些不按规定时间睡觉的小孩更有可能出现行为问题。然后那些不按时睡觉的小孩变成按时睡觉后经常会在行为上有所改善，这真的很重要，因为它表明睡眠时间规律真的能够帮助这些小孩表现更好。

Here's another one to think about. In this one, scientists looked at children who were reading for pleasure. That means that they picked up a magazine, a picture book, a story book. The data showed that children who were reading for pleasure at the ages of five and 10 were more likely to go on in school better, on average, on school tests later in their lives.

这里还有另外一个需要去思考的研究。在这个研究中，科学家观察了那些为快乐而阅读的孩子，也就是说他们经常拿起一本杂志、画册、故事书。数据显示那些5到10岁的为快乐而阅读的孩子，通常来说更可能在学校有着更好的表现，在学校的测试成绩也会更好。

And not just tests of reading, but tests of spelling and maths as well. This study tried to control for all the confounding factors, so it looked at children who were equally intelligent and from the same social-class background, so it seemed as if it was the reading which really helped those children go on and score better on those school tests later in their lives.

而且不仅仅是阅读方面的测试，还包括过拼写以及数学测试。这个研究试图控制所有的干扰因素, 因此它是观察了同等智力水平并来自相同社会阶级背景的小孩，所以看起来似乎是阅读真的帮助了这些孩子在以后的学校测试中取得更好的成绩。

Now at the start, I said the first lesson from this study was not to be born into poverty or into disadvantage, because those children tend to follow more difficult paths in their lives. But then I said that parenting matters, and that good parenting, if you can call it that, helps children beat the odds and overcome some of those early disadvantages.

开始的时候，我说过从这个研究中学到的第一课是不要出生在一个贫穷落后的家庭。因为这些孩子容易走上一条更艰难的生活道路。但是后来我又说了父母很重要，好的养育方式，如果你觉得这就够了，能帮助孩子打破命运的魔咒并且克服部分早期的劣势。

So wait, does that actually mean, then, that poverty doesn't matter after all? You could argue it doesn't matter if a child is born poor -- as long as their parents are good parents, they're going to do just fine. I don't believe that's true. This study shows that poverty and parenting matter.

等一下, 这是否就意味着贫穷只是一件无关紧要的事？你可以说它无关紧要，如果一个小孩出身贫穷—— 只要他们的父母是称职的，他们也会过得好。但是我不相信这种说法。研究表明贫穷和养育方式都对孩子影响很大。

And one study actually put figures on that, so it looked at children growing up in persistent poverty and how well they were doing at school. The data showed that even when their parents were doing everything right -- putting them to bed on time and reading to them every day and everything else -- that only got those children so far.

事实上有一个研究对此进行了量化对比，它观察了那些在长期穷困的家庭长大的孩子以及他们在学校的表现。数据表明，即便他们的父母正确的做了每一件事—— 督促他们按时睡觉，每天给他们朗读等等—— 也只能帮孩子到这样。

Good parenting only reduced the educational gap between the rich and poor children by about 50 percent. Now that means that poverty leaves a really lasting scar, and it means that if we really want to ensure the success and well-being of the next generation, then tackling child poverty is an incredibly important thing to do.

好的育儿方式也只能将富孩子和穷孩子之间的教育差距缩小一半。那意味着贫穷会留下一个持续的创伤, 也意味着如果我们真的想要确保下一代能够成功并且幸福, 那么消除儿童贫困就是一件非常重要的事情。

Now, what does all this mean for you and me? Are there lessons here we can all take home and use? As a scientist and a journalist, I like to have some science to inform my parenting ... and I can tell you that when you're shouting at your kids to go to bed on time, it really helps to have the scientific literature on your side.

所有这些对你和我来说又意味着什么呢？我们能从这学到什么并为我所用吗？作为一个科学家和记者，我想用一些科学来报告我的育儿经验，我可以告诉你，当你对你的孩子大喊着让他们按时睡觉时，知道科学数据可以帮助你很多。

And wouldn't it be great to think that all we had to do to have happy, successful children was to talk to them, be interested in their future, put them to bed on time, and give them a book to read? Our job would be done.

如果我们只需要跟孩子交谈、关心他们的未来让他们按时睡觉、给他们书去阅读就能让他们快乐、成功，这难道不是想想就让人很高兴的事吗？我们的工作完成了。

Now, as you can imagine, the answers aren't quite as simple as that. For one thing, this study looks at what happens to thousands and thousands of children on average, but that doesn't necessarily say what will help my child or your child or any individual child.

正如你能想像得到的，答案不止这么简单。首先，这项研究调查了成千上万的普通小孩，但这未必就能帮助我的或你的小孩，或任何其他的单个小孩。

In the end, each of our children is going to walk their own path, and that's partly defined by the genes they inherit and of course all the experiences they have through their lives, including their interactions with us, their parents.

最终，每个小孩都有自己的路要走，而那条路部分取决于他们所继承的基因。当然，还有就是他们生活中的经历，包括他们与身为父母的我们的互动。

I will tell you what I did after I learned all this. It's a bit embarrassing. I realized I was so busy working, and ironically, learning and writing about this incredible study of British children, that there were days when I hardly even spoke to my own British children.

告诉你们，我在知道所有这些后所做的事。那真的是有点尴尬。我意识到我太忙于工作了。而讽刺的是，在学习和撰写这个关于英国小孩的伟大研究时，有好多天我都难得跟我自己的英国小孩说话。

So at home, we introduced talking time, which is just 15 minutes at the end of the day when we talk and listen to the boys. I try better now to ask them what they did today, and to show that I value what they do at school.

所以我们在家里引入了谈话时间，也就是在每天睡觉前的15分钟里，我们会跟男孩子们交谈。我比以前更努力地问他们今天做了什么，并向他们表明我很重视他们在学校的表现。

Of course, I make sure they always have a book to read. I tell them I'm ambitious for their future, and I think they can be happy and do great things. I don't know that any of that will make a difference, but I'm pretty confident it won't do them any harm, and it might even do them some good.

当然，我会确保他们随时有一本可以阅读的书。我告诉他们我对他们的未来充满期望, 我认为他们能快乐并做出了不起的事。我不知道我做的这些是否对他们有影响，但是我很相信至少不会对他们造成伤害，甚至可能对他们有一些帮助。

Ultimately, if we want happy children, all we can do is listen to the science, and of course, listen to our children themselves. Thank you.

最后，如果我们想要孩子们快乐，我们所能做的就是听信科学，当然，还有就是聆听孩子们的声音。谢谢。

【免责声明】文章内容来源于网络，未找到原始出处，版权归原作者所有。本文信息仅供分享，本公众号平台不对文章内容真实性承担任何法律责任。若有来源标注错误或侵犯了原作者的合法权益，请与我们联系更正或删除。感谢！