I wonder what other well known studies have incorrect conclusions
The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
11–20 of 282 posts
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#12The paper may be good, but the article is poorly written:
- it suggests that it is only after the publication of this paper that people have questioned the causality relationship in the results of the original study
- it talks about reinterpretation of the original study's outputs as 'replication', whereas nowhere in the article does it suggest that anyone attempted to replicate the experiment
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#13Our cats have never in their lives had to worry about food, yet they still become anxious around mealtimes. That suggests that it is trait common to all mammals regardless of their "wealth".
um... They naturally get hungry, in other words. They recognize patterns. This isn't the same.
This is more like giving your cat a treat, and testing whether or not the cat has the self-control to not eat it for a time so they can double their reward.
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#14I wonder what other well known studies have incorrect conclusions
Somewhat premature to conclude that this 900-person study is definitive.
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#15Has anyone studied whether time preference might be genetically heritable? Edit: why am I being downvoted for this?
You get down voted on hacker news for suggesting anything outside the norms and asking people to think.
Since that affects Karma people tend not to do it and you just get a group think.
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#16Has anyone studied whether time preference might be genetically heritable? Edit: why am I being downvoted for this?
Because it's closely related to research on the genetic basis of intelligence. Poor research on these topics in the past have been used to justify rather egregious social policies (eugenics, birth control, racial discrimination, etc). Even if it is heritable, making the knowledge public can only lead to a sense of fatalism.
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#17You'd expect poor kids to be good at self control (they're used to not be fed every 15 minutes) while rich kids being spoiled and not caring for an extra marshmallow.
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#18Who cares about an extra marshmallow? They should do the experiment with slices of pizza.
I'd imagine it hard to conduct a controlled experiment when step 1 is "bake a pizza".
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#19Has anyone studied whether time preference might be genetically heritable? Edit: why am I being downvoted for this?
Because it's closely related to research on the genetic basis of intelligence. Poor research on these topics in the past have been used to justify rather egregious social policies (eugenics, birth control, racial discrimination, etc). Even if it is heritable, making the knowledge public can only lead to a sense of fatalism.
So rather than try to improve the science we should just ignore the question?
Re: The Marshmallow Test: What Does It Really Measure?
#20I found the following post [1] to make a very compelling argument that the Marshmallow test isn't really testing for the ability to defer gratification, but for a "generalised ability/desire to take and pass tests" (manifesting itself here as the desire to pass the Marshmallow test). The post argues that this is an underrecognised character trait which can predict success in today's Western test-oriented world. Certainly I personally possess this trait in spades, and my personal history is full of instances where this trait was extremely useful to me.
Assuming the trait is either heritable or culturally imbued (and intuitively it seems very likely that at least one of those is true), it makes sense that rich parents are more likely to have children who are either natively or culturally high in The Desire To Pass Tests: indeed, our society heavily rewards people who have TDTPT, so rich parents are more likely to be high in TDTPT and therefore are more likely to have genetically or culturally passed it to their children.
[1]: https://hotelconcierge.tumblr.com/post/113360634364/the-stan...