The Key to a Long Life: Conscientious

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Philip Moeller, On Friday 8 April 2011, 23:07 SGT

Long before the age of gene therapy and miracle medical treatments, the secrets of long life
were being gathered and revealed in a unique study of 1,500 children born about 1910. By
studying these people throughout their lives, successive generations of researchers collected
nearly 10 million pieces of observable data and have been able to produce solid insights into
human longevity.

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"Most people who live to an old age do so not because they have beaten cancer, heart disease,
diabetes, or lung disease; rather, the long-lived have mostly avoided serious ailments
altogether," according to Howard S. Friedman and Leslie R. Martin, in their recent book,
"The Longevity Project."

"The best childhood personality predictor of longevity was conscientiousness--the qualities of

a prudent, persistent, well organized person," according to the two professors (he at the
University of California--Riverside, and she at La Sierra University). "Conscientiousness . . .
also turned out to be the best personality predictor of long life when measured in adulthood."

Their book chronicles research begun in 1921 by Lewis Terman, a Stanford University
psychologist who selected 1,500 bright and generally high performing children and began
amassing detailed information about their personal histories, health, activities, beliefs,
attitudes, families, and other variables.

Over the next eight decades, other academics maintained the Terman Project and assembled
exhaustive details on all facets of the original subjects' later lives. It is this unique depth of
detail that has permitted Friedman and Martin to reach what they feel are scientifically sound
conclusions about what it takes to live a long life.

"It was not cheerfulness and it was not having a sociable personality that predicted long life
across the many ensuing decades," they wrote. "Certain other factors were also relevant, but
the prudent, dependable children lived the longest. The strength of this finding was
unexpected, but it proved to be a very important and enduring one."

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The book presents three reasons why conscientious people live longer:

1. They are more likely to obey the rules, protecting their health, and not engaging in risky
behaviors such as smoking or driving without a seat belt. If a doctor tells them to take a
medicine, they take every prescribed dose.

2. "Conscientious individuals are less prone to a whole host of diseases, not just those caused
by dangerous habits," they found. "It appears likely that conscientious and unconscientious
people have different levels of certain chemicals in their brains."

3. "The most intriguing reason conscientious people live longer is that having a conscientious
personality leads you into healthier situations and relationships," the research concluded.
"They find their way to happier marriages, better friendships, and healthier work situations."

Many of the subjects of the Terman Project faced difficult challenges in their adult lives,
including bitter combat in World War II, divorces, stressful jobs, and career reversals.
Conscientious people had the ability to weather these problems. They displayed "self healing"
personalities that helped them find their ways back to healthy lifestyle paths. People without
such behavioral traits and healthy coping skills didn't fare as well and were often unable to
bounce back.

Other strong longevity traits, Friedman and Martin say, include strong connections with other
people and groups, either through marriage or outside activities. Also, "those with the most
career success were the least likely to die young. In fact, on average the most successful men
lived five years longer than the least successful." While happiness was not a cause of longer
life, "the sense of being satisfied with one's life and achievement was very relevant to
resilience."

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Here are 10 questions used to create a personality scale that will help determine how
conscientious you are. The scale is based on work done by Terman, the book's authors, and
other research. The five possible answers to each question are the same:

1 -- Very inaccurate.

2 -- Moderately inaccurate.

3 -- Neither accurate nor inaccurate.

4 -- Moderately accurate.

5 -- Very accurate.

1. I am always prepared.

2. I leave my belongings around.

3. I enjoy planning my work in detail.

4. I make a mess of things.

5. I get chores done right away.

6. I often forget to put things back in their proper place.

7. I like order.

8. I shirk my duties.

9. I follow a schedule.

10. I am persistent in the accomplishment of my work and ends.

Scoring for questions 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, and 10: Each answer is worth one to five points, matching
the numbers of the answers (one point for very inaccurate, two points for moderately
inaccurate, and so forth, up to five points for very accurate). For questions 2, 4, 6, and 8,
reverse the scoring order (one point for very accurate, two points for moderately accurate,
and so on, up to five points for very inaccurate).

Total scores can range from a low of 10 to a high of 50. "This score is a good measure of
conscientiousness," the book says. "Total scores between 10 and 24 indicate very low
conscientiousness . . . Scores between 37 and 50 suggest exceptionally high
conscientiousness."

To test the accuracy of your own answers, ask your spouse or close friend to tell you what
answers they think apply for you. They know you very well and might have a more objective
view of your personality traits than you do.

Now, the good and bad news about how conscientious you are is that you can change your
personality, but you can't invent a new one overnight. The highly conscientious people in the
Terman study had little clue that such behavior would be associated with living a very long
life. They behaved this way in their everyday lives because it came naturally.

"It doesn't matter how many New Year's resolutions you make," the book said. "In fact, rapid
and pervasive changes are usually quickly abandoned by anyone undertaking them. Lasting
adjustments happen with smaller, but progressive, steps."

Medical treatment is conspicuously absent from the book's longevity findings. "So-called
modern medical cures have played a relatively minor role in increasing adult life span," the
authors wrote. "Social relations should be the first place to look for improving health and
longevity."

Twitter: @PhilMoeller