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Sanjay Gupta MD

Investing With Babies' Minds

Aired September 27, 2014 - 16:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN HOST: Hello and welcome. We have a very special SGMD today from New York City, in partnership with the Clinton Global Initiative.

And today, we are talking about the science of success, investing in babies' minds.

Let me just tell you, there is something a little intimidating about doing a panel on intelligence. It's very hard to look at, I think, especially when you meet our guests in just a moment.

But before I introduce them, I want you all to think about a couple of points. What is intelligence? What is the value of intelligence? And how do we ensure that every child can reach their full potential?

I'm a neurosurgeon and I am fascinated with what I think is the most complex biological system in the world. So, let's just take a moment to appreciate it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA (voice-over): By the time a human embryo is five weeks old, it is just the size of an apple seed. But the brain has already begun to grow. By eight weeks, the basic structure of the brain and central nervous are in place. The neural network is spreading out and even now the nerve signals are traveling more than 150 miles per hour.

At birth nearly, all 100 billion neurons of the human brain are already in place. But the brain only weighs about 25 percent of what it will later on. It's about to embark on its fastest growing period, quadrupling in size by the time a child finishes preschool. By age 6, the brain is 90 percent of its adult size.

During that burst of growth, 700 new neural connections are formed every second, as we gain the capacity to smile around two months, to talk usually around a year and to dress ourselves around the age of 3.

In those early years and, in fact, throughout our lives, the brain changes through experience, learning to speak, taking those first steps, understanding colors and shapes, forming novel thoughts.

But as certain neurons are used more frequently other unused neurons go away. It's a process called pruning. And almost anything can shape us in those baby and toddler years -- first words, first ice cream, first TV show, first argument for better or worse.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA: And here with me now, Dr. Rosemarie Truglio. She's the vice president of education and research for the Children's Television Workshop. Among other things, that means she is responsible for developing the curriculum that you see on "Sesame Street."

Also, Dr. Nadine Burke Harris. She's pediatrician from Oakland, California, where she's founded the Center for Youth Wellness, she runs. She's also an expert adviser to Too Small to Fail. It's an initiative which was launched by Mrs. Clinton and the Clinton Foundation to improve the wellbeing of kids from birth to age 5.

And I think you may recognize the woman right here to my left.

HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: Hi, Sanjay.

GUPTA: Back about 40 years ago, I think the book was called "Beyond the Best Interest of the Child."

CLINTON: Ah, you've done your homework. Yes.

GUPTA: Forty years ago, you're about 10 years old.

CLINTON: Yes, I was.

(LAUGHTER)

CLINTON: Very precocious fifth grader.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: But, you know, it's interesting because we went back and looked at some of that research. And when you talk about educational achievements, we've certainly made progress in some areas. But over 40 years, I think most people agree not nearly as much as we would have wanted as a country.

Do you point to any particular things and say here is where we sort of missed the boat?

CLINTON: I think a couple of things, and in no particular order. I think that life was not as fast paced or as stressful in many, many ways 40 years ago and certainly even before that. Yes. Were there problems? Did our parents and grandparents face a lot of difficulties? Absolutely.

But income has stagnated. People's economic futures don't seem as predictable and stable as they did perhaps to a prior generation. And that kind of stress and anxiety does effect how you interact with your children and in particularly your youngest children.

I think also with the increasing ubiquity of television and now screens of all kinds in our homes, I think too many people drew the wrong conclusion that, yes, talking, teaching your children words, singing to them, reading to them, all of that is great, but that people are talking on TV.

So, we put them there or if we give them, you know, access to a computer, or an iPad or whatever, you know, they're going to get that, too. And what we now know from the brain research, it doesn't work that way. It's the human interaction and reinforcement.

GUPTA: You talk a lot about adverse childhood experiences, as I read in your paper.

DR. NADINE BURKE HARRIS, FOUNDER & CEO, CENTER FOR YOUTH WELLNESS: Yes.

GUPTA: How -- I mean, there are a lot of kids who have tremendously tough lives. And they face a lot of adversity. How do you stratify who is going to be able to rise through that and maybe even be better because of it? And those who are just going to be really harmed by it?

HARRIS: Yes. So, the term adverse "childhood experiences" comes from the seminal study that was done by the CDC and Kaiser Permanente. And when they looked at 17,500 adults they found those with abuse and neglect, or household dysfunction like parental mental illness or parental incarceration or domestic violence, those folks had dramatically increased risk of chronic disease.

And when we look at individuals susceptibility to that, what science shows us that it's a combination between nature and nurture. It has to do with our biology but it also has to do with the environment and, frankly, we know that early detection makes a big difference. And particularly when thinking about young children we know that children's exposure to adversity, the earlier we intervene the better the outcome.

GUPTA: Is it important, Secretary Clinton for two parents to be able involved. You wrote the book "It Takes a Village." I mean, two parents, one parent, does it have to be a parent to provide some of these buffers that Burke Harris is talking about?

CLINTON: Well, I think as the doctor said there are other ways to provide that buffer. Sometimes it is a grand parent or older sibling, or an aunt or an uncle. Every child needs, though, a buffer. or as I'd like to say, every child needs a champion. And that champion has to really invest in that child and to a certain extent buffer and protect that child from whatever the other stresses are.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUTPA: Things like divorce, I mean, single parents. There are people who thrive and do fine, and people who are just really affected by that.

CLINTON: You know, and just very quickly, as a child I didn't know much about my mother's really terrible upbringing. But as I came -- you know, older teenager, young adult, and I started learning more about what she had been through, I was amazed. I thought, my gosh, you know, how did she turn out to be a loving mother for us? And I asked her one time, I said, you know, with everything that was

going on, she had very young parents, 14 and 16. They divorced and sent her off to California. She had a miserable time in her grandparents' home and had to leave when she was 13 and all that.

She said at every point, there was some adult that showed her kindness. And so, this is not just about the family and the pressure on the family. It's about the adult community. It's about the teacher she had. She didn't have any money for lunch. She was like in first grade and she would come every day and they used to eat the classroom and she sit there, she had nothing to eat and the teacher noticed it.

So, the teacher started bringing extra milk and maybe an extra half a sandwich but -- and not to embarrass my mother but to say, oh, Dorothy, I'm so full. I've got too much food again, would you like it? And years later, my mother realized that, in effect, that teacher was feeding her.

GUPTA: You know, I think, Secretary Clinton, once you're a parent and you hear a story you are describing about your mother, it hits pretty hard. It's tough to imagine kids, going. But it's happening still obviously right now. And some of -- you know, when I had kids I didn't know what the right things were. My oldest is 9. I have 7- year-old and a 5-year-old.

The idea that parents should instinctively or intuitively know sort of -- there is no rule book, there's no guide book.

Rosemarie, you know -- I mean, this is part of what you do, I think. "Sesame Street", is it a kids show or a parenting show?

ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO, CHILDREN TELEVISION WORKSHOP: I think it's both, and that's what's wonderful about Sesame Street. And I often say, "Sesame Street" brings the adults into what we call a co-viewing situation. And I urge parents of preschool children to watch the show because you're going to learn a lot about parenting because we are modeling, we are talking about -- we're modeling how you can be interacting and how you can scaffold learning. So, it's both.

GUPTA: We are talking about investing in babies' minds. We're going to talk about screen time, when, what, how much and we're going to make a few tough calls on this. I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUPTA: We are back with a very special SGMD here in New York, in partnership with the Clinton Global Initiative.

We are talking about how to invest in baby's minds, how to make sure every child has a shot at success. Anyway, I want to ask about a slightly different topic, though.

Have you guys heard of the marshmallow test?

BURKE HARRIS: Yes. TRUGLIO: Yes.

GUPTA: So, the basic premise is these are preschoolers, and they are put into a room and there's a marshmallow there. They are basically told, look, if you wait 15 minutes, no one else is in the room, you wait 15 minutes, and don't eat that marshmallow, we'll give you two marshmallows instead. That was it and they wanted to see what the kids would do.

They found the kids who waited tended to do better overall in life. They were more likely to go to college. They were more likely to have successful careers. And it was the concept of self-control.

And self-control is something that "Sesame Street" tries to do as well and something they try to teach. And for those who don't have young children in the house anymore, I want to play a short clip that I thought was hilarious to remind people just a little bit what their work is about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: Wait.

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: Why wait?

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: Because this is the waiting game. And if you wait to eat the cookie until I get back, you get two cookies.

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: There is no picture of cookie. It's a real cookie.

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: You won the waiting game!

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: If you wait longer, do we get three cookies?

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: No.

UNIDENTIFIED CHARACTER: Then what are we waiting for?

(MUSIC)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA: I think --

(APPLAUSE)

GUPTA: It's well done. And parents can learn as well.

Can self-control be taught? TRUGLIO: Yes, it is taught. Now, when you're talking about executive

function, which are the cognitive skills that underlie your ability to self-regulate, your ability to control your affect, your ability to have focused attention and more importantly your ability to shift your attention.

So, think about these children who have to go from home to school or different context there are different rules and regulations. You need to be able to know how to behave and process information in these various contexts.

GUPTA: Speaking of self-control, by the way, I think you did a good job with Chelsea.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: She is not finding out the sex of the baby.

CLINTON: We have shown great executive function.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: I think our work here is done.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: You don't know if you are going to wind up as president. You don't know --

(LAUGHTER)

CLINTON: We go from toxic to really toxic.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: We don't know if you are running, do we?

CLINTON: Yes, I think that is right.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: But we do know you're going to be a grandmother --

CLINTON: That is absolutely the case, yes.

GUPTA: Do you think -- based on this discussion that we are having or the things you would do, obviously your role will be different, you'd be a grandmother, not a mother, but do you think you will do things differently now with this grandchild versus how you helped raise Chelsea?

CLINTON: You know, so interesting because on my book tour over the summer I must have shaken 70,000 hands and probably more than half of them mentioned something about being a grandparent. And often times, it was sort of joking like, oh, it was so much better than being a parent. If I would have known how good it was, I would have skipped the first part. That kind of back and forth.

I think -- I think that you have just a different perspective in part because your time in life and all of that to enjoy a grandchild. And most of us when we have our children, you know, we are still younger, we're still striving, we're still pre-occupied about what's going to happen in our lives and what the future looks like. I think a lot of people look back and say, well, you know, I did the best I could, but maybe I could have spent more time or I wish I had or I wish hadn't been so busy and all the rest of it.

And I think being a grandparent, you just have that freedom, at least that's what I'm told and I'm anxious to find out whether that's true being a member of that club.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA (voice-over): At over 400 pounds, Sia Fiegel was revered in her Samoan culture.

SIA FIEGEL, CNN FIT NATION TRIATHLETE: I was seen as a woman of strength. There's no strength in pain, in hurt, in living with uncontrolled diabetes.

GUPTA: Complications from her diabetes even forced her to have all of her teeth removed.

FIEGEL: It was on that same day that I decided to be an activist against obesity and diabetes.

GUPTA: To jump-start her own weight loss, she joined the 2014 CNN Fit Nation team and began training for the Malibu Triathlon. On September 14th, she became a triathlete.

FIEGEL: I feel like I'm a new person. I feel like I've been rebirth, I've been baptized.

GUPTA: She finished the race with her team by her side. More than 100 pounds lighter now, she's not ready to stop.

FIEGEL: I will do it again.

GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Malibu.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUPTA: We're are back with a special SGMD, in partnership with the Clinton Global Initiative. Our focus: how to bring out the best in babies and toddlers.

With me, Secretary Hillary Clinton, Cindy McCain, and Geoffrey Canada.

Toddlers learn an average of 2,100 words an hour from their parents. In working class families, it's 1,251. In poor families, 616.

I mean, it's a huge difference, 30 million --

GEOFFREY CANADA, FOUNDER, HARLEM CHILDREN'S ZONE: It's a huge gap. It's a huge gap, and, you know, one of the things we were trying to figure out is why does that gap exist? Why aren't poor families talking?

And so, we started something we call Baby College, where we are sitting with parents trying to teach them about what we know about brain development. And you know what? No one has said it was important. A lot of our parents think my kids are going to learn when I send them to school. And I don't have a great education so I don't really have much to offer.

So, they are waiting. As long as the kid is fed and healthy and clean, they say, I am doing a good job as a parent. The fact that you should actually be talking with that child, they can't see what's happening with those neurons.

We have found when we explain it in ways that our families understand how critical it is that they actually are great teachers and they are the first teacher, and that silly singing thing that you do like, I can't sing I feel silly, that actually is like taking your kid to college. That a lot of this, Sanjay, is that poor parents no one has sat down and explained that this is the most important thing they could give their child.

GUPTA: Next time, I will sing to my daughter I will say it is like going to college.

(LAUGHTER)

GUPTA: But it's really a good point. The message does seem to get across. I mean, we have looked at some of the data and people are hearing this message.

Let me ask you, Cindy McCain, Arizona in particular, you have a lot of immigrants living there. Secretary Clinton alluded to this earlier. They don't speak English as first language often.

What do you sing? I mean, are people less likely to be reading to their children, to be speaking to their children, engaging that way?

MCCAIN: Yes. The answer is absolutely yes. For the reasons that were mentioned, they don't want to speak for their first language mostly in Arizona in Spanish. They don't want to speak if they think they should be speaking English instead. They don't want to reveal to the school or the neighborhood or to the community center that they don't know or they have questions or they are frightened.

So, what Too Small to Fail is teaching and what we believe in is speak the language, sing the language, story tell the language, talk to your baby, talk to your baby. It doesn't matter what language it's in. It's so important. And when you see these mothers' eyes, you give them the knowledge that

it is OK to do that, it's like a light bulb goes on. It's wonderful to watch it. It's enlightening and it's uplifting for the parents.

GUPTA: I want to ask you something, as well, Geoffrey about something you have talked about in the past. I can't help but ask in the wake of what's happened with Adrian Peterson recently, disciplining your child, corporal punishment.

First of all, I mean, there is no guide book on any of this stuff and it is obviously a provocative issue for a lot of people out there. What do you tell people you are helping counsel?

CANADA: So, one of the areas we cover in Baby College has to do with discipline. And the most contentious issue we deal with is whether or not parents should use corporal punishment. And you find a large set of beliefs around that is what is going to stop my child from ending up becoming a criminal or breaking the law, that they hear this spare the rod and spoil the child.

All of this is so deeply ingrained in lots of cultures. So, we took the time to have the debate with parents, you just can't say, don't do it, to have a debate with parents and say, look, there is another way that's more effective the science is clear that you can be more effective in getting what you want without using corporal punishment.

Now, I'll say this on the professional athlete issue. There is no excuse for that abuse. I don't excuse it from poor families who have no resources. I tell them if I see you injure your child I will call the authorities. I'm going to do that. You may not do that, right?

So, we can't make allowances for folk who actually have means and money. I just think it is a bad policy and we should just clamp down on that because if you injure a child, you'll probably injure other people, too, the women. So, this is like in America, this is like enough with this hurting people. Let's put an end to it.

(APPLAUSE)

GUPTA: Unfortunately, we have to leave it there. Let me just say it's been an honor to be on the stage with all of you, Cindy McCain, Geoffrey Canada.

Secretary Clinton, you've been working on these issues for 40 years, I hope we were able to honor some of your perspectives today, as well. Unfortunately, that's all the time we have for each one of us here.

And everyone watching, you have the power to influence someone else's life. That's something that I've learned today. I hope you have as well. And to use that power wisely.

That's going to wrap things up for SGMD. Time now, to get you back into the "CNN NEWSROOM" with Deb Feyerick.