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Marshmallow Test
A friend of mine who is into Cognative Science mentioned this neat little experiment to me.
It goes like this:
The researcher leads a pre-school (age 4 or 5) child into a room. In the room there is a pedistal and a large, tasty marshmallow.
The researcher tells the child "you can eat the marshmallow whenever you want. But, if you wait until after I get back, you will be allowed to eat two marshmallows!"
The researcher now leaves the room.
This being a science experiment, they recorded what the children did.
Some of the children ate the marshmallow before the door closed on the researcher.
Some of the children walked up to the marshmallow, handled it, sniffed it, and agonized over not being able to eat it.
Coping strategies varied -- one child even went to sleep.
Others didn't have much of a problem ignoring the marshmallow.
Apparently, about 1/3 ate the marshmallow, 1/3 had serious issues resisting, but managed, and 1/3 had no problem resisting.
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They came back and looked at the study participants years and years later. The children who had the least problem delaying their gratification had where showing signs of becoming much more successful than the children who had problems, or who couldn't resist eating the marshmallow.
So, here is the question. Do you think you could have resisted the marshmallow? Do you have any relatives you want to try the marshmallow test on?
When I asked my folks, they didn't know about me (snarf snarf yum!), but they figured my brother would have had absolutely no problem with waiting the 15 minutes before the researcher came back.
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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.
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