Title of Journal Research: Cohort Effects in Children’s Delay Gratification

Source: American Psychological Association, 2018 (Volume 54, No.8)

Authors: Aber, Laurence Peake, Philip Wilson, Nicole
Ayduk, Ozlem Schaefer, Catherine
Carlson, Stephen Sethi, Anita
Michel, Walter Shoda, Yuichi

I. Overview

The journal research is all about the effects of delay gratification to children over the
years. It is a correlational study that examines if there are changes in the result from
generations to generations. It is believed that the ability to resist temptation and let go of
immediate pleasure in exchange of a long term goals or pleasure during early childhood has
a link to the development of self-control during adolescence to adulthood. It is also part in
developing self-regulation and executive function in Developmental Psychology such as
conscious controls of thought, actions and emotions and in the process of working memory.
It is also accepted that societal influences has a vital role in constructing human
development.

The result of the study shows that there is a decrease in time in delaying gratification but
there is an increase in self-control to the children today that they will have greater executive
function skills when they become adolescent and adults. Improvement in the delay
gratification is also related to parental skills; they instill the value of self-control to their
children that made an impact in the development of individual’s self-regulation and
conscious controls or the executive function.

II. Critique/Comments

The objective of the paper is to know the development of individual’s executive function
and to comprehend if self-control over children evolves over time. The societal and parental
influences also have a vital role in the development of the individual’s conscious control and
processes of memory. Maybe school and counselling will benefit in this study because
children are more likely to pay attention in their abstract thoughts and somehow develop
their cognitive skills because of the “screen time” brought by the technology over the years.
It is also a vital factor that during the development, they should know when and how to
employ self-control skills on our rapid changing environment.

The specific concept that is clear in the paper and based on the previous courses is Erik
Erikson’s Psychosocial Development. It is how social interactions and relationships play a
vital role in the development and growth of a person. One part of growing and maturing is
we tend to experience dilemmas and conflicts in life that changes us and mold us to what
we become today. It will always start during our early childhood and as we grow up we tend
to seek our own self which motivates our actions and behavior.

One concept also that may be unclear in the beginning, the individual differences in
delay behavior during early childhood can predict the developmental outcomes during
adolescence and adulthood. How we can predict the developmental outcomes in delay
behaviour when there are other factors to consider such as the society, the parental skills.
There are more factors to consider in the development of one’s individual.

Unclear concept that furthers the matter is the result that elderly people or parents
thought that children of this generation have less likely to have less self-control. They do
believe that the technology is somehow responsible for this. Children tend to relieve the
boredom easily just by getting “screen time”. As such, they incorporated this that they are
more likely to get the immediate pleasure or rewards rather than the long term goals. It may
be somehow true but we can’t conclude that immediately by just one test or simply because
we are now in a rapid changing environment that children tends to get what they want.

There are concepts that are in contradicting such as how cohort affects the delaying of
gratification. Cohort is blending or treating people as a group (e.g. same race, age, sex) but
we can’t really define or conclude that this may have an effect once you grow over time. A
person of the same age, gender or sex has a unique traits and coping mechanisms. We
may have some similarities but we have distinct differences.