Casey Flashcards
(12 cards)
Outline the background to Casey
-The ability to delay gratification refers to the ability to resist a small reward now in favour of a greater reward later
-To test this ability Walter Mitchell developed the Marshmallow test
-Children were told they could have one marshmallow now or wait 15 minutes and get 2
-He administered this test to a sample of 4 year old children in America
Outline what is meant by a low delayer
-The children that were not able to wait and delay gratification
What is meant by a high delayer
-The children that were able to delay gratification and waited the 15 minutes for the second marshmallow
Outline the aim of study1 of Casey
-wanted to find out whether people who had difficulties delaying gratification at the age of 4 still had difficulties delaying gratification at 44
Outline the sample used by Casey
59 participants from the original marshmallow study
32 high delayers
27 low delayers
Outline the procedure used by Casey in his experiment on delaying gratification
-participants were shown a series of faces pop up on a laptop computer. Some of these had neutral expressions but in the ‘hot’ version of the task
-participants either saw happy or fearful faces
-participants would have a button in front of them that they had to press when they saw a particular expression on a persons face
-This task is know as the ‘Go/NoGo’ task
-In the most important condition of the experiment, particpants were told to press the button when they saw fearful faces but to hold back from pressing the button when they saw happy faces. Would the low delayers be able to resist pressing ‘Go’ for those happy faces and delay gratification
Outline the findings/conclusions from Casey
-The high delayers (who had been able to delay gratification at 4 years old) were found to be much better at resisting pressing ‘Go’ button when they saw happy faces than the low delayers
-These results seemed to suggest that the ability to delay gratification is a relatively stable charecteristics within people
Outline the aim of study 2 of Casey not neurobiological findings
Outline the sample of study 2 in Casey
27/59 orignal anticipants agreed to take part
-11 low delayers
-15 high delayers
-(one persons results exclude due to poor test results)
Outline the procedure of study 2 in Casey
Casey gt her particpants to repeat the ‘Go/NoGo’ task
-This time while hooked up to a FMRI scanner
Outline the findings/ conclusions from study 2 Casey
Low delayers
-higher activity in their ventral striatum
-lower activity n ther inferior frontal gyrus
High delayers
-Lower activity in their ventral striatum
-Higher activity in their inferior frontal gyrus
Outline Caseys conclusion from study 2
-Differences between people in their ability to show self control and delà gratification can be régalâtes to neuro biologie differences
