Attention

Thirty-six toddlers each played in two rooms — one with 4 toys, one with 16. With fewer toys they switched half as often, stayed twice as long, and found 63% more ways to use a single toy. And how a child played in one room did not predict how they played in the other.

A 21-year longitudinal study of 430 children found that attention and persistence measured at age 4 predicted college graduation at age 25 — while reading and math scores at ages 7 and 21 did not.