In re: Kevin Drum's hypothesis about lead and criminality, there were other things going on then of course. There was a nice article in the British Medical Journal on a critical period in brain development, the first two years of life. That period is 'critical' in that you have to have nutrition then for brain development; you can't make it up with a normal diet at some other 2 years of life. Our WIC (Womens Infant and Children) nutrition program started then. At least what I heard from Parkland in Dallas, pre-eclamsia which had maybe affected a third of pregnancies declined in incidence following WIC. And this hypertensive disorder in pregnancy may be associated with a doubling of the incidence* of ADHD which is in turn associated with later criminal behavior. *Zinc and childhood hyperactivity. Brophy MH. Biol Psychiatry. 1986 Jun;21(7):704-5. No abstract available. PMID: 3708042 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE