The joke is that in this version of the experiment, the child isn’t being tested, the marshmallow is. And in this case, the marshmallow has decided to eat this one child instead of waiting until later, when it would have been allowed to eat two children.
5 minutes is not worth 1 marshmallow.
Marshmallows are not that good, so one is way enough.
As a kid, I could never trust adults who wanted to limit good things. Who’s to say the strange adult in a white coat would really bring a 2nd marshmallow? What if they actually remove the marshmallow instead?
In short, it can only separate kids in two groups: the blind followers of authority and the other ones.
The marshmallow experiment is one of those that self-help gurus and LinkedIn ‘influencers’ love to peddle as being meaningful, in no small part because it tells people who had lucky upbringings that they are inherently better than others, and not just a product of their environment. But when it’s actually examined critically, it falls apart.
“The Stanford marshmallow experiment was a study on delayed gratification in 1970 led by psychologist Walter Mischel, a professor at Stanford University.[1] In this study, a child was offered a choice between one small but immediate reward, or two small rewards if they waited for a period of time.”
The joke is that in this version of the experiment, the child isn’t being tested, the marshmallow is. And in this case, the marshmallow has decided to eat this one child instead of waiting until later, when it would have been allowed to eat two children.
Oh shit, I totally didn’t see that the marshmallow was biting the kid. The image is so small it looked like a power outlet behind him on the wall
I always found this study to be lacking…
5 minutes is not worth 1 marshmallow. Marshmallows are not that good, so one is way enough. As a kid, I could never trust adults who wanted to limit good things. Who’s to say the strange adult in a white coat would really bring a 2nd marshmallow? What if they actually remove the marshmallow instead?
In short, it can only separate kids in two groups: the blind followers of authority and the other ones.
Guess what? This effect has been found in other experiments!
The marshmallow experiment is one of those that self-help gurus and LinkedIn ‘influencers’ love to peddle as being meaningful, in no small part because it tells people who had lucky upbringings that they are inherently better than others, and not just a product of their environment. But when it’s actually examined critically, it falls apart.