The longer a child can resist eating a sweet, the more successful they tend to be later in life. In the 1960s, a Stanford professor ran a test on four-year olds in which he put a marshmallow on the table and told the child they could either eat it now, or, if they waited 15-minutes, they would get a second marshmallow.
The researcher noticed the longer a child held out, the better they were doing in school. By the time the participants were in their mid-teens, the average score of a 15-minute hold out at age four was 210 points higher than a 30-second hold out. Adult success followed that pattern.
This experiment is also a great example of why successful people aren't any fun.
