Consider the student golfer example mentioned earlier. What happens to a person who plays at golf but never works to improve his game? While some people might continue to play and enjoy the game, this student admitted that he would get bored, frustrated and eventually lose interest. The golfer becomes apa¬thetic, passive, lethargic, and the game of golf would lose its value. Generalizing from this example, we might say that diligence, perseverance, and concentration improve whatever talents and abilities to which we apply them. Our intellectual skills are improved when we focus our attention, think through what is required for performing a task. Diligence, perseverance, concentration are character traits, what philosophers would call virtues, that contribute to the improvement of human well-being. You are improved as a person when you have the abil¬ity to approach tasks with such a temperament. Conversely, people who do not work at any task risk becoming lazy, careless, and apathetic. Developing good work habits contributes to a character that is capable, competent, effective, and skillful. Parents, for example, seek to instill such good work habits in children to provide them with important lifelong skills. One study by psychologists George and Caroline Valliant concluded that "the willingness and capacity to work in childhood is the most important forerunner—more important than native intel¬ligence, social class, or family situation—of mental health.