Child Of Our Time
12/01/2006
Child of Our Time continues to amass an extraordinary record of the stories of 25 babies (and their families) who come under the scientific spotlight. The children were born at the beginning of the 21st century and the first programme in the new series investigates whether childhood experiences can determine adult happiness, or if happiness is rooted in our genetic make-up.
The children of the series are nearing 6 years old (although the project will last for 20 years). By this age, scientists believe that a good part of their ability to be happy has been determined. Although life's slings and arrows will affect their future happiness momentarily, experts say that it will probably creep back to a level that is set at an early age.
Professor Winston states that "We all seek happiness, but it's a great deal more complicated than we think. This programme asks questions such as 'Do happy children become happy adults?', 'Does having more really make us happy?' and 'Why do early relationships have such an affect on our well being? Happiness is part biological and we are all born with a certain potential for it".
Using the latest EEG technology (short for electroencephalogram - which records brainwave patterns from the continuous tiny electrical signals coming from the brain) an area of the brain is identified that might hold the key to our happiness. "It is thought to be possible that different areas of the brain can lead to people being either enthusiastic and extrovert or introvert, anxious and prone to sadness. All of the children and their parents were tested and through this investigation of the electrical impulses in their brain, it was found that there was a remarkable similarity between parent and child". The bond between a mother and her child is essential in establishing the child's self-confidence and future happiness.
The children involved in the series all have completely different life experiences. "Helena, the oldest of the children was one of a set of triplets. The other two sadly died at birth, whilst Helena, who was delivered at 24 weeks, fought on and is now a healthy and happy child. Her parents spent the first couple of years of her life rarely going out as they were so scared that she would get an infection. Despite all this, Helena is a bright happy confident child. The bond between herself and her mother is incredibly strong. Reuben, another of the children, was also born in a traumatic birth, in which his mother needed an emergency caesarean to deliver him. On birth he seemed healthy, but he then turned blue and needed to be resuscitated twice. He spent the next 2 weeks in intensive care. His mother believes that this early separation may be responsible for the fact that she doesn't feel the same bond between them that she does with her other children".
By looking at each child individually and their life and experiences to date, their levels of happiness were recorded through a number of experiments. "One of the experiments involved the children rating their happiness on a scale of 1-10. It was however found that this was not particularly fair, as the children were literally giving a rating of their feelings at that particular moment, and not their general happiness. In order to rectify this problem, the children and their parents were given a personal organiser for 5 days which bleeped every hour to remind them to record their feelings". Robert also decided to record his own happiness using the same method, through which he found he was happy 80% of the time. Helena, the oldest child in the study was found to be happy almost all of the time.
Further experiments identified which children were optimists and which are pessimists. They were left in the room with a talking puppet to see how easy they found it to make friends and a tempting new toy was used to see if any would sacrifice friendship for material goods. Some of the children were better than others at befriending the puppet, others were a little more cautious and opted for the material goods.
"Activities which challenge us give us great long term satisfaction and create something that scientists call 'Flow'. 'Flow' is a state of mind that is essential for happiness. It is achieved through being fully absorbed in a creative task. The children were asked to conduct a jazz trio - and produced striking results. Some of the children became fully involved, whereas one child actually ran out of the room. 1 in 7 of us can achieve flow easily, others just cannot"
Their resilience is also put to the test. "This is one of the most important elements of happiness. At some stage everyone will experience lows in life - and being able to bounce back is a vital skill. The children were placed in front of a tower of bricks which were knocked down. Some were completely thrown by this, whereas others rebuilt the tower claiming it was even better than before".
"From each of the children, it has become clear that some of our happiness is down to genes, but experiences in life are also important. Making a child feel happy and loved early on is essential if they are going to be a happy adult"
This is the first show in a series that also looks at 'Flesh and blood' - which studies the relationships between siblings; 'Right and wrong' - which explores obedience and learning right from wrong and 'Learning' - which looks at different learning styles.
Robert's Career
Author, scientist and TV presenter Robert Winston became a household name through his television series' 'The Human Body', 'Superhuman', 'Walking with Cavemen', and 'The Human Mind'. He has won 3 BAFTAs. His pioneering work in the field of human fertility has helped thousands of childless couples have "miracle babies" and earned him an international reputation.
He is a Consultant in Reproductive Medicine at Hammersmith Hospital - where his research department accounts for 10% of the NHS research and development budget. He is also Professor of Fertility Studies at Imperial College, London. A Winner of the Royal Society's prestigious Michael Faraday Gold Award, he was made a life peer in 1995. Having also studied how the brain works, Robert undertook an IQ test which proved he is really very clever. The average result of the test he took is 100 but he scored 155, enough to slot him into the top 1% of the population. In July 2004 Robert published his first book aimed at children, 'What Makes Me Me?'. In which Robert explored how genes, experience and biology work together to make everybody unique. Robert built on this theme in his first book for adults, Human, that he published last October which explored the diversity of our live, from how we function to how we think and act.
Child of our time is on BBC1 on Sunday January 15th at 8.00.