It doesn’t matter if a child is more trusting; only self control affects how long they wait
I agree, but I don’t think anyone believed that nothing else matters to marshmallow eating.
We have to distinguish between the propositions:
(P1) A significant fraction of the variance in marshmallow eating among children observed in past experiments is explained by trustingness.
(P2) Inducing large changes in trustingness in children produces changes in marshmallow eating behavior.
This study supports (P2), but it is only informative about (P1) to the extent someone previously assigned substantial probability mass to the proposition:
(P3) There is large variation in childrens’ trustingness, but trustingness doesn’t affect childrens’ marshmallow eating decision.
I suspect most people didn’t assign much probability to (P3), and so this study shouldn’t change their opinion very much.
Agreed, but I think the reason this experiment is interesting is that it previously didn’t occur to people (or at least to me) that trustingness is a possible alternative explanation of the classic marshmallow experiment, rather than self control. It was a blind spot.
It didn’t occur to me either, but ironically it was the first thing my wife suggested when I told her about the marshmallow experiment yesterday (it came up in the context of that professor’s comments about fat people, self control, and PhD programs recently). This post’s timing was thus quite serendipitous.
It probably occurred to her because she is a doctor who works with primarily poor patients, many of whom are black and hispanic, and so is used to the associated mistrust when crossing cultural and socio-economic lines.
EDIT:
The key is to focus on what the experimental subjects observe, not the rules the experimenters intend to follow. The kid is promised another marshmallow, he doesn’t know that he is going to get one, and he doesn’t know that the one he has now won’t be taken away. With priors associated with abuse, the kid should eat the marshmallow as soon as possible.
I agree, but I don’t think anyone believed that nothing else matters to marshmallow eating.
We have to distinguish between the propositions:
(P1) A significant fraction of the variance in marshmallow eating among children observed in past experiments is explained by trustingness.
(P2) Inducing large changes in trustingness in children produces changes in marshmallow eating behavior.
This study supports (P2), but it is only informative about (P1) to the extent someone previously assigned substantial probability mass to the proposition:
(P3) There is large variation in childrens’ trustingness, but trustingness doesn’t affect childrens’ marshmallow eating decision.
I suspect most people didn’t assign much probability to (P3), and so this study shouldn’t change their opinion very much.
Agreed, but I think the reason this experiment is interesting is that it previously didn’t occur to people (or at least to me) that trustingness is a possible alternative explanation of the classic marshmallow experiment, rather than self control. It was a blind spot.
It didn’t occur to me either, but ironically it was the first thing my wife suggested when I told her about the marshmallow experiment yesterday (it came up in the context of that professor’s comments about fat people, self control, and PhD programs recently). This post’s timing was thus quite serendipitous.
It probably occurred to her because she is a doctor who works with primarily poor patients, many of whom are black and hispanic, and so is used to the associated mistrust when crossing cultural and socio-economic lines.
I’m not so trusting, and it occurred to me.
EDIT: The key is to focus on what the experimental subjects observe, not the rules the experimenters intend to follow. The kid is promised another marshmallow, he doesn’t know that he is going to get one, and he doesn’t know that the one he has now won’t be taken away. With priors associated with abuse, the kid should eat the marshmallow as soon as possible.