Would You Eat the Marshmallow?

Ever hear the one about the marshmallow, the kids, and the researchers?

Well, it’s not actually a joke. In fact, it’s a very interesting look in to how the minds of children—and, more importantly, adults—work. In the study, done at Stanford University in the 1960’s, researchers took a bunch of little kids and brought them into a room with one researcher and one marshmallow.

The marshmallow was then placed in the middle of the table. Just as things get started, the researcher gets a phone call. As he leaves to take the phone call (which isn’t a real phone call, but simply part of the set-up), the researcher tells the child that he has to leave the room for just a little bit to take a phone call. Then, he gives the kids two options...

The first is they can eat the marshmallow right now. If they do, that's all they will get—just that single marshmallow. Or, they can wait until the researcher comes back. If they wait, they will get a whole bag. The researcher walks out of the room and leaves the child and the marshmallow on the table.

Results?

Most of the kids immediately ate the marshmallow. A small percentage waited until the researcher came back and got a whole bag. Some of the kids who ate the marshmallow still wanted a whole bag and complained. But, that's not the important part. The important part is what happened many years later.

The researchers followed up and interviewed these kids when they were all grown up, and the results were quite telling. Basically, the kids in the group who ate the marshmallows right away were relatively unsuccessful both in their careers and financially, and they had many broken personal relationships. On the contrary, the adults from the group who did not eat the marshmallow had great careers, made more money, and had lasting personal relationships. It is theorized these results were due to a person's ability to delay gratification. In other words, the kids who had will power and were able to put off a small reward now for a larger one later were able to achieve much greater successes in all aspects of their lives.

That makes complete sense. Sometimes these "gratifications" take a long time to materialize. But the discipline involved and the ability to see the “big picture” is a skill and trait that isn’t present in all of us.
We all look to the future with both hope AND anxiety. Will we be able to retire? Will we travel more, fish more, buy a fancier car? Will our children have it “better than us?”

Instead of anxiety and worry, think about what you can do today for yourself to perhaps delay that gratification a bit and get a much bigger reward later. Perhaps it’s a change in diet. Maybe it’s a new commitment to exercise. Maybe it’s a nagging injury that you have hoped will “go away.”

Whatever the issue is, if you’re looking for help, our office can provide it. From monthly nutrition classes (which have a very high audience satisfaction rate), to exercise plans, to adjustments for achy muscles and joints, help is just around the corner!

Oh yeah, and for the sake of full disclosure, I think an eight-year-old Nic Giebler would have eaten the single marshmallow.