His seminal study of consumption behavior and preferences, conducted earlier this year in greater Beijing, showed that children's preferences determined 69% of the family's overall spending.

CNN: LITTLE EMPERORS

Wednesday's 23-13 party line vote came a few weeks after psychiatrist Robert L. Spitzer, in a letter to the editor of the Archives of Sexual Behavior, apologized for his 2003 study of reparative therapy, which suggested that it could help gays and lesbians become straight.

CNN: STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Varadhan, New York University, for his work in probability theory, especially his work on large deviations from expected random behavior which has revolutionized this field of study during the second half of the 20th century, and become a cornerstone of both pure and applied probability.

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