The Stanford Marshmallow Experiment
Martin B. Justesen
Hi!
I just want to share a little lesson from one of my rapid games I played today. It is the chess equivalent of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment, which was a study on delayed gratification in 1972 led by psychologist Walter Mischel. In the 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. If you have kids you might know it can be a real challenge to push back your impulse to get the reward and gratification. Life imitates chess said Kasparov, right? Today I played the following game, where I failed the marshmallow test.. I played Black:
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. e3 e6 4. Nc3 d5 5. Nf3 Nc6 6. a3 cxd4 7. exd4 Bd6 8. Be2 dxc4 9. O-O a6 10. d5 exd5 11. Nxd5
11…Bxh2+?? (simply just Nxd5 first and if Qxd5 then Bxh2+ collecting the Queen)
12. Kxh2 Qxd5 13. Qxd5 Nxd5 14. Bxc4 Be6 15. Rd1 O-O-O 16. Bg5 Nf6 17. Bd3 Ng4+ 18. Kg1 f6 19. Bf4 Bb3 20. Bf5+ 1-0
The follow-up research on the kids from the marshmallow experiment showed that those who managed to wait and collect the double reward also did better later in life. And the same goes for chess players who wait, think, and collect the full reward..
Have a nice weekend!
Best,
Martin
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