Mischel's Marshmallow Test

Kathryn

Prof W

COMP

November 27, 2012

Rough Draft: Marshmallows, SATs and Self-Control

[Citations are NOT correct, Need to finish Works Cited Page First]

Figure 1: Children who are able to pass the marshmallow test enjoy greater success as adults. (The New Yorker)

Figure 1: Children who are able to pass the marshmallow test enjoy greater success as adults. (The New Yorker)

In the early 1970s child psychologist researcher Walter Mischel began conducting studies that looked into a child’s ability to delay gratification. He observed preschoolers at the Bing School of Nursery at Stanford. The task was fairly straightforward. Children would be given a marshmallow and told by the research assistant that they could have the one marshmallow as soon as they wanted, but if they waited for the researcher to return then their reward would be another marshmallow. As expected, some preschoolers were able to delay much better than others and those who delayed used various tactics to increase the time they could wait; some of these tactics are illustrated in Fig. 1. It was Mischel’s later follow-up studies which would shock some researchers. Mischel found that the preschoolers who were high-delayers were significantly more competent at delay task, academic competencies, and coping competencies 10, 13 and even 40 years later. These results indicated that delay of gratification is critical to our success later on in life.

Self-regulation should be taught in some manner beginning in pre-school and continuing on through grade school. Academic education in this country focuses on memorization and regurgitation more so than learning other useful and necessary skills that apply to school and beyond. The advantages of this ability have been shown across many studies. While inheritable to some extent, it is an ability that can be improved upon with effective instruction.

In understanding Mischel’s subsequent studies, which showed the long term benefits for the high-delayers,...