Ask HN: Why aren’t we teaching spoilt children value of delayed gratification?

Would you say that university and school aren't inherently delayed gratification? No matter the topic, you study for a while, then do your examination. This process has a delay, there is lots of learning and teaching on the way to end in a gratification in form of a diploma.

This applies to science as much as it applies to sports or any skill for that matter.

Traveling the world is also like that. You have to take you trip, get on a journey and finally arrive at some place, that maybe is worth it all. Delay, effort and then gratification. Simple as going to the beach and packing everything you need beforehand. Even cleaning up the flat so you can just have a shower and fall into a cozy bed after you come back.

The marshmallow experiment is much more about obedience, self control, trust, discipline and not giving into temptation as it is to delayed gratification, when you think about it. Do you believe food becomes more gratifying with the amount?

This is what you do with a dog, who can not grasp a grand concept of how to improve hisfuture situation by taking the difficult route now. The hungry dog will eat up anything good, until his stomache is critically filled and he has to sleep it off.