The Marshmallow Test

Some 30 years ago a professor at Stanford began a longitudinal study that became known as the Marshmallow Test.

His test subjects were 4 year old children.

He sat them in a room, one at a time, and placed 4 marshmallows on a table in front of them. He informed the children that they were free to eat the marshmallows anytime they wanted. But if they waited to eat them until he returned they would get 4 more.

Then he left the room and observed the child through a hidden camera.

He left them alone in the room for 20 minutes.

Of the hundreds of kids he tested only a small number of them passed the test, which was waiting the full 20 minutes without eating the marshmallows. They exhibited the positive trait of delayed gratification.

Over the next 14 years he kept tabs on the kids. What he found was the kids who passed the test did better in school, scored higher on the SAT, were socially well adjusted, etc.

The kids who failed were the opposite.

After reading this I realized I had a barely 5 yr old in my house, Garrett. The perfect candidate to run my own experiment on.

To be honest I went into this convinced of a negative outcome. But I reasoned that when he failed the test I would at least have some scientific proof to explain his challenges.

So I found some marshmallows and brought Garrett into his room. I sat him at the desk and placed 4 marshmallows in front of him. He was excited, but a little confused why I was just giving him this treat. So I explained he could eat them now or wait until I came back and I would give him 4 more.

As I walked out of the room he was just staring at the marshmallows.

I went and found Mindy and explained how I had turned our son into a lab rat. She chuckled and exclaimed "he'll never make it".

As we waited for the minutes to tick by we entertained ourselves with thoughts of the torture Garrett was going through and how he would soon succumb.

When I finally came back into the room - there were no marshmallows.

As I paused to collect my thoughts and decide how to turn this into a learning moment (lecture him) his face slowly morphed into that mischievous grin we know so well.
He opened the drawer and there were all 4 marshmallows.

Ohh he's good. He's just toying with us.