Adolescent self-control predicts midlife hallucinatory experiences: 40-year follow-up of a national birth cohort.
BACKGROUND
Associations between self-control in adolescence and adult mental health are unclear in the general population; to our knowledge, no study has investigated self-control in relation to psychotic-like symptoms.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the relationship between adolescent self-control and the midlife mental health outcomes of anxiety and depression symptoms and psychotic-like experiences (PLEs), controlling for the effect of adolescent conduct and emotional problems and for parental occupational social class and childhood cognition.


METHODS
A population-based sample, the MRC National Survey of Health and Development (the British 1946 birth cohort) was contacted 23 times between ages 6 weeks and 53 years. Teachers completed rating scales to assess emotional adjustment and behaviors, from which factors measuring self-control, behavioral, and emotional problems were extracted. At age 53 years, PLEs were self-reported by 2918 participants using 4 items from the Psychosis Screening Questionnaire; symptoms of anxiety and depression were assessed using the scaled version of the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28).


RESULTS
After adjustment for the above covariates, poor adolescent self-control was associated with the presence of PLEs in adulthood, specifically hallucinatory experiences at age 53 years, even after adjustment for GHQ-28 scores.


CONCLUSIONS
Lower self-control in adolescence is a risk factor for hallucinatory experiences in adulthood.
Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Science, Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science, Tokyo, Japan; MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing at UCL, London, UK; nishida-at@igakuken.or.jp.
Atsushi
A
Nishida
Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK;
Kate Man
KM
Xu
Department of Health Sciences and Hull York Medical School, University of York, York, UK;
Tim
T
Croudace
Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; CAMEO, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust, Cambridge, UK;
Peter B
PB
Jones
Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Cambridge Cognition Ltd, Cambridge, UK.
Jenifer
J
Barnett
MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing at UCL, London, UK;
Marcus
M
Richards
D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D000328:Adult; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006212:Hallucinations / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*; D012307:Risk Factors; D013997:Time Factors; D006113:United Kingdom / Q000453:epidemiology; D055815:Young Adult
adolescent; conduct problems; longitudinal; psychotic-like experiences; self-control