The Marshmallow Test

BigT555

I was browsing through the leangains website and came across this article that I found interesting. It puts the mental aspect of dieting somewhat into perspective, along with a few tips at the end which I wholeheartedly agree with;

In the early 1970s, a psychologist named Walter Mischel conducted an experiment involving four-year-olds. He placed each child in a room, where they sat down at a table. In front of them, a marshmallow. Mischel then made each child an offer. He could eat the marshmallow right away or wait for a few more minutes and receive another one. Almost everyone decided to wait. Mischel then left the room for twenty minutes.

While a few of the four-year-olds were able to resist the temptation for up to fifteen minutes, many lasted less than one minute. Others just ate the marshmallow as soon as Mischel left the room.

This was a test of self-control. If the child wanted to achieve the goal of receiving another marshmallow, then he needed to temporarily ignore his feelings and delay gratification for a few more minutes. What this study showed was that some children at the early age of four were much better at this than others.

What I found interesting are the strategies the successful children employed in order to endure the experiment. They kept themselves distracted. Covered their eyes, played with their hands or just entered a trance-like state where it seemed they were lost in their thoughts. Their attention was elsewhere.

The failed strategy of the unsuccessful children was the complete opposite of that; in essence, they fixated on the marshmallow almost as if attempting to stare it down, actively fighting the temptation.

How does this translate to the various strategies used by the fitness crowd?

When some people are dieting, they are DIETING. They treat it like a full-time job and they're in the gym every day, sometimes twice a day. Their spartan diet is meticulously planned and carefully dispensed throughout the day. They are the ones that fixate on the marshmallow.

Others take a more balanced approach. Diet and training is part of their life, but it blends in beautifully. They are the ones that tries to forget about the marshmallow. It's background noise to them.

I'll give you a concrete example to show you what I mean. Some people schedule a weekly cheat day, which usually involves a day on the weekend when they can eat what they want. In practical terms, this often means that they pig out and end up on the couch in a torpor-like state. This day becomes the high point of their week. They restrict calories severely throughout the week in order to allow themselves the cheat day. Their training typically includes hours of cardio. On Thursday they start planning their shopping list for Saturday and on Friday they lie sleepless in giddy anticipation of the forthcoming food fest. They are fixating on the marshmallow, making it the center of the world.

I could give you a similar example when it comes to training. The overly enthusiastic young guy embarking on a 6-day-split that ends up overtraining and sick or hurt. He too was fixating on the marshmallow.

The solution then is to stay distracted.

You shouldn't buy into the myth of what it takes to achieve your goals. Don't get me wrong, it takes dedication. Sweat, yes. But that needs to be maintained as a regular, long-term commitment. And that's impossible to do if you're constantly thinking about it. It needs to be part of your daily routine, but it needs to blend in. Again, background noise and balanced. Or else you won't last.

If you're too fixated on the marshmallow, you'll eat it sooner or later. In this context it means you'll screw up your diet and/or training, burn out and lose all motivation. The more physical and mental energy you invest in your training and diet, the more likely you are to fail.

And that's why some of the busiest people are the most successful ones when it comes to reaching their physique goals. They have other things to think about.

Guidelines and attitudes to live by

* Spend too much time focusing on your goal and you will end up sabotaging yourself. This may not hold much ground in other areas of life where, in order to be successful, focus and time investment is of critical importance; such as building a business, managing a large corporation or becoming a highly-competitive elite athlete. But it's definitely one that applies to diet and strength training for the average Joe. Stay distracted. Have hobbies. Have a life. If diet and training become the sole focus of your daily routine, the road to your goals will feel like a very long road indeed.

* Commitment and dedication dispensed over a longer time period is superior to more focused efforts. The latter has a higher rate of failure and greater chance of backfiring on you and is why people fall off the wagon. This is my personal experience, but it's also backed up by studies. A good example of this are the numerous reformed health enthusiasts that pop up after New Year's Eve. They go at it hard for a few weeks, but are often back into their old patterns of sporadic training and a sub par diet by February. Another example is the rebound that many competitors experience after contest dieting. Avoid this with a balanced approach without extremes.

* Most people will not benefit from more than four training sessions per week when attempting to gain muscle mass.

* The great majority shouldn't be in the gym more than three times per week when cutting. You don't need the gym for cardio. Go outside.

* Use checkpoints to help you focus on long-term and not short-term progress

* Never attempt to train yourself into a caloric deficit. Don't spend hours on the treadmill. Diet comes first, cardio second. The dumbest fat loss strategy ever devised is used by people that wake up early in the morning before going to work to do cardio and follow that up with "recovery shake." Congratulations, you just wasted two hours of your life. Cardio is good for cardiovascular health, but most people use cardio as a fat loss tool - and force themselves through regimens that aren't very conducive to their daily routine (or mental sanity). Next time, skip the shake and the cardio. Sleep two hours longer, but skip breakfast and fast until lunch time. This way you can create the same caloric deficit with the added bonus of feeling more rested and having saved more time. You'll be much better off.

* Intermittent fasting is an easy way to create a calorie deficit. Your "cardio" is to stay productive during the fast and work. If you don't have a job, work on projects that are important to you. Learn. Read books. Write. Don't sit around and brood about your diet or what you have in the fridge.

Final note: I first learned about the marshmallow test in
How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer. A good read if you're interested in human behavior and psychology. It's interesting to note that the marshmallow test predicted future success in many other areas of life. When a follow-up study on each child was done twenty years later, it was found that children who waited longer also had better academic success and less behavioral problems than the ones who ate the treat sooner.

TL;DR- Don't think about it, just do it.

eta; link to original(though this is a copypasta of pretty much the entire article); http://www.leangains.com/2010/01/marshmallow-test.html

fastfoodietofitcutie

Very insightful, makes you stop and think. The only thing I disagree with is the cardio, I think it's important not just for weight loss but for overall health.

bltrexler

radio lab did a podcast on this very subject, very interesting.

Lonestar5775

Food for thought, thanks for posting!

Unknown

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Squirrel698

I enjoyed this article. However, I don't agree that fasting is equivalent to cardio. Cardio does work your muscles and heart much more then sleeping in and just not eating until dinner. That sort of thing would do the opposite of growing muscles.

Besides I love my runs, they are excellent for my anxiety and boost my creative potential.

But I do agree with the article where it says that diet and exercise shouldn't be the focal point of your existence. It would make you an extremely boring person, just for starters.

heidispideymfp

I like that you've posted this, thank you.
Gave me something to think about, other than my diet.

Kalikel

I say most of that all the time.

I think the biggest problem people have is that they don't want it. They want to be a non-smoker, but they don't want to go through quitting. They want to be thin, but they don't want to log through losing weight.

Once you decide what you want and are committed and determined, nothing can stop you. There is no struggle left. You just get on with the business of doing it and wait to be victorious,

The ones who decide to be fat will enjoy their food and life more. The ones who decide to be thin will enjoy their weight loss more.

The ones who waver in indecision will always be miserable.

greeneyes972

I enjoyed this article. However, I don't agree that fasting is equivalent to cardio. Cardio does work your muscles and heart much more then sleeping in and just not eating until dinner. That sort of thing would do the opposite of growing muscles.

+1

SezxyStef

I say most of that all the time.

I think the biggest problem people have is that they don't want it. They want to be a non-smoker, but they don't want to go through quitting. They want to be thin, but they don't want to log through losing weight.

Once you decide what you want and are committed and determined, nothing can stop you. There is no struggle left. You just get on with the business of doing it and wait to be victorious,

The ones who decide to be fat will enjoy their food and life more. The ones who decide to be thin will enjoy their weight loss more.

The ones who waver in indecision will always be miserable.

not sure I totally agree with this.

If you decide you are going to do it yes you go do it...but that means educating yourself about the best and most healthy way of doing it...

not going whole hog and wearing yourself out in the process and damaging yourself or making yourself ill.

When you educate yourself per this article that is when you can do it and do it successfully...

I mean let's be frank...people can lose weight...some people are experts at it...losing the same 20, 30, 40 ...100lbs over and over again...but to be sucessful you need to do it right...lose the weight and maintain it.

MystikPixie

I can't believe someone wasted time and money on an experiment like this and used 4 year olds for it. Of course the majority ate the marshmallow, a 4 year old has no control over anything their brain does, they do not think in an analytical way. They might as well have performed the experiment on people who have been lobotomized. That would've been the equivalent to the 4-year olds as far as mental capacity goes.

Squirrel698

Actually if you read the whole study, you'll find they proved that the 4 year olds who resisted the marshmallow for 15 minutes had more self-control during the whole course of their lives. So, yes, it was a long term study done many years ago.

BigT555

Very insightful, makes you stop and think. The only thing I disagree with is the cardio, I think it's important not just for weight loss but for overall health.

I enjoyed this article. However, I don't agree that fasting is equivalent to cardio. Cardio does work your muscles and heart much more then sleeping in and just not eating until dinner. That sort of thing would do the opposite of growing muscles.

i agree cardio is important to overall health and it makes you a better, more efficient athlete by far, however this article is referring to people using cardio as a fat loss tool specifically, where too much of a good thing becomes a real issue. overexertion and exhaustion can be a big factor in whether someone sticks with a new lifestyle or not. kept in relatively small quantities though is absolutely can benefit someones exercise regime

BigT555

I can't believe someone wasted time and money on an experiment like this and used 4 year olds for it. Of course the majority ate the marshmallow, a 4 year old has no control over anything their brain does, they do not think in an analytical way. They might as well have performed the experiment on people who have been lobotomized. That would've been the equivalent to the 4-year olds as far as mental capacity goes.

really i think that was what gave the study significance. if this had been performed on adults then i thinks its safe to say most would have been able to wait out the 20 minutes to earn the reward. however when performed on 4 year olds they were able to get a good demographic between those who waited and those who did not, therefore they were able to interpret the factors that influenced each parties decision

theres other advantages to using youths as study subjects, it takes experience out of the equation, and the ability to think analytically is a hindrance in a few situations. what if the subjects were counting calories? i'd be chucking that marshmallow out the window personally

leadslinger17

Reading the first paragraph of this makes me want to run out and buy a bag of marshmallows and shove every one in my fat little face.


So....self control problems you say?

lol

DeguelloTex

I agree with parts and disagree with parts.

If I can be done with weight loss and into maintenance or bulk in nine months by being a little more aggressive versus two years by following the "if you have 75+ pounds..." approach, I'm much more likely to succeed by being more aggressive.

sparacka

Bump

vismal

I enjoyed this article. However, I don't agree that fasting is equivalent to cardio. Cardio does work your muscles and heart much more then sleeping in and just not eating until dinner. That sort of thing would do the opposite of growing muscles.

Besides I love my runs, they are excellent for my anxiety and boost my creative potential.

But I do agree with the article where it says that diet and exercise shouldn't be the focal point of your existence. It would make you an extremely boring person, just for starters.

He never says fasting is equivalent to cardio. He is simply saying that diet is more important than cardio, which it is. Plenty of people can achieve a lean muscular physique with diet alone and no cardio at all. Very few people can achieve a lean, muscular physique with lots of cardio and no attention to diet. Intermittent fasting does not hinder muscle growth or cause muscle loss. Cardio does not "work your muscles" in a muscle building sort of way. You need resistance training with progressive tension overload to achieve that.

Martin was one of my favorite fitness writers of all time. It's a shame he got so jaded that he basically stopped writing. His website is a treasure trove of information even if you don't like the idea of intermittent fasting. He was the first guy that I came across that said things like "You don't need 6 meals a day", and "training a body part per day is stupid". This article also contains my favorite Berkhan quote of all time:
" The dumbest fat loss strategy ever devised is used by people that wake up early in the morning before going to work to do cardio and follow that up with "recovery shake." Congratulations, you just wasted two hours of your life."

eventerchick80

bumping for later reading.

Kalikel

I say most of that all the time.

I think the biggest problem people have is that they don't want it. They want to be a non-smoker, but they don't want to go through quitting. They want to be thin, but they don't want to log through losing weight.

Once you decide what you want and are committed and determined, nothing can stop you. There is no struggle left. You just get on with the business of doing it and wait to be victorious,

The ones who decide to be fat will enjoy their food and life more. The ones who decide to be thin will enjoy their weight loss more.

The ones who waver in indecision will always be miserable.

not sure I totally agree with this.

If you decide you are going to do it yes you go do it...but that means educating yourself about the best and most healthy way of doing it...

not going whole hog and wearing yourself out in the process and damaging yourself or making yourself ill.

When you educate yourself per this article that is when you can do it and do it successfully...

I mean let's be frank...people can lose weight...some people are experts at it...losing the same 20, 30, 40 ...100lbs over and over again...but to be sucessful you need to do it right...lose the weight and maintain it.

I'm not sure, exactly, what you were disagreeing with. Most of what you said had nothing to do with what I said. I respect your right t disagree and have a different opinion! I wish you well on your journey!

But that was and remains my opinion. I'm not changing it right now.

dwygtd

BUMP

suga1018

Makes sense. If you fixate and obsess, it will be harder to resist. Distract yourself and you just might find you don't even think about the temptation.

meridianova

I think the biggest problem people have is that they don't want it. They want to be a non-smoker, but they don't want to go through quitting. They want to be thin, but they don't want to log through losing weight.

you can want something with all your heart and soul, but if you don't have good information as to what to do, you're never going to succeed. the diet industry is worth billions of dollars, most of which are all based on claims that a silver bullet, magic cure exists, and they're the only ones that have it, but it can be yours for just 47 easy payments of $299.95!!!

you don't jump into something, ANYTHING, without education first. and unfortunately there is just too much bad information out there when it comes to food, exercise, and weight loss. and sometimes, even with all that information, you still don't get the results that everyone else seems to have. the hardest part of that is understanding why, or just being ok with it.