Mrs. Corliss's Creations: More Marshmallows, Please!

I Just Can't Wait

Can you?

One of the most popular lessons in psychology, besides Pavlov’s dog training and Skinner’s reinforcement theory, is Mischel and Ebbesen’s marshmallow test. For those who are not familiar with the marshmallow test, here is a quick video summarizing their work.

The original findings of this test was that young children who showed self-control at a young age, and could wait for the second marshmallow, were more likely to be successful later in life.

Interestingly enough, this study was replicated, with a few changes, but the results were significantly different. The original sample of 90 kids, were enrolled in the Stanford preschool, easy access for a Stanford researcher. The new study, conducted by Tyler W. Watts of New York University, included 900 children, all from different demographics. Another change was Watts cut down the required 15/20-minute wait time of the second marshmallow, to seven minutes. Perhaps a bit more developmentally appropriate for a four-year-old.

Just like Mischel, Watts' followed up with the subset group of children who were able to delay gratification and wait the time for the second marshmallow. However, instead of corroborating the original findings, Watts' found that the ability for the children to wait had very little positive impacts on them later in life. Even more so, “…this effect was nearly obliterated when the children’s backgrounds, home environment, and cognitive ability at age four were accounted for” (Hendricks, 2018, pg.1). Based on the new study, Watts was able to come to the following conclusion, “, "Our results show that once background characteristics of the child and their environment are taken into account, differences in the ability to delay gratification do not necessarily translate into meaningful differences later in life." They also added "We found virtually no correlation between performance on the marshmallow test and a host of adolescent behavioral outcomes. I thought that this was the most surprising finding of the paper” (Hendricks, 2018, pg.1).

Even though the study produced new and interesting results, the most intriguing part of the study was a possible connection between those children who waited for the second marshmallow and affluent parents. Even though the ability to delay gratification doesn’t correlate to the child’s ability to be successful later in life, it can be an insight into the child’s economic background. I have a few possible theories to this finding.

1. It is entirely possible that there is a correlation between children delaying gratification and socioeconomic status. For children of poverty, there might not be a guarantee of food, let alone a treat. For them, there could be a risk in waiting.

2. If a child is living in poverty, there is a likelihood they are experiencing more than one at risk factor. Poor nutrition, one parent household, lack of parental education. These at risk factors can impact brain development and IQ. Self control is connected to the frontal cortex. Could at risk factors directly relate to the lack of development of the frontal cortex?

3. The children who were able to delay gratification were able to because of their exposure to different experiences in which they have seen the positive outcomes of waiting. Such as: waiting for a large gift or vacation, their meals end with dessert, or getting an allowance for chores.

The replication of the study highlighted two important points for me. The first being the strong impact home life can have on a child's future success and opportunities. The study found that the children in similar demographics were in similar places 11 years later. Their socioeconomic status played a bigger role in where they were at age 15, than if they delayed eating the marshmallow. As a teacher, this places even more importance on our education system. We cannot control where our students come from, but we can continue to study and understand how good teaching and safe environments can help counter the effects of an at risk home environment. The second point is the importance of re-evaluating experiments that might not be able to be generalized to a newer population. Without Watts' new study, we would still be teaching to the same marshmallow test.

I want to end this blog by leaving something to ponder, perhaps a discussion for another day. This video is about the topic of self-control and the frontal cortex. It seems studies, such as the marshmallow test, are focused on our desire to instill self-control in children, but this video addresses the notion that in some cases, a lack of self-control might be a good thing. I found it interesting and thought provoking. Enjoy!