How did the old children marshmallow test get through to the final draft. It comes right before the author relates a specific thing to his own study. The marshmallow test original results and thoughts have largely been seen as incorrect. Wealth was the main factor. It can relate to the title, but still the incorrect info shouldn’t be there.
To elaborate on that: one interpretation of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment is that learning to trust adults is a key predictor for success in life.
Recall the experiment: kids who resisted gobbling the marshmallow in order to earn 2 marshmallows went on to be awesomer adults. The original explanation is that kids with the ability to delay gratification (or who come up with beeminder-y tricks to distract themselves from the tempting marshmallow) will be served well by that skill the rest of their lives.
But another explanation – https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121011090655.h... – is that those seemingly impulsive kids are just the kids who don’t trust the adults who promise the 2nd marshmallow. They’re like “yeah, I’ve heard that before” and gobble while the gobbling’s good. In other words, they’re not failing to delay gratification, they’re responding to the situation perfectly rationally based on their past interactions with adults. To put it overly dramatically: flaking out on your kids ruins their lives!
(I’m not sure how much credence to give that interpretation, and suspect that there’s truth in the original interpretation too. But it kind of feels right to me. Flaking out on anyone is really bad. But kids especially.)
I don't think the claimed findings of the marshmallow test were relevant here, just the fact that some kids managed to avoid eating the marshmallow while others did not.
The marshmallow test makes no sense to me. You're telling me I get one marshmallow now, or I get one more if I wait 30 minutes and have to sit here bored looking at the one marshmallow I could have already eaten? The reward just isn't there. It seems like it measures kids who want to please the researcher.
> It seems like it measures kids who want to please the researcher
There are the kids who immediately eat the marshmallow. And then there are those who try not to eat it and fail. The latter is relevant. The former is not.
The kids do have to sit in the room whether or not they eat the first marshmallow, but I agree that there are quite a few explanations for what it's measuring beyond self-control.
But the article just referenced some techniques the children in the test used, not the claims derived about their characteristics, which is the discredited part AFAIK?
