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the ability to delay immediate gratification for the sake of future consequences is an acquirable cognitive skill.
In the high delayers, the prefrontal cortex area, which is used for effective problem solving, creative thinking, and control of impulsive behavior, was more active. In contrast, in the low delayers, the ventral striatum was more active, especially when they were trying to control their reactions to emotionally hot, alluring stimuli. This area, located in the deeper, more primitive part of the brain, is linked to desire, pleasure, and addictions.
Freud thought the newborn began as a completely impulse-driven creature, and he speculated about how this bundle of biological instincts that urgently pushed for immediate gratification managed to delay gratification when the maternal breast was withdrawn.
While these tactics were a marvel to behold in preschoolers, they are familiar to anyone who has ever been trapped in the front row at a boring lecture.
“YOU CAN’T EAT A PICTURE”
Children who were exposed to images of the treats waited almost twice as long as those who saw irrelevant images or no images on the lit screen, or those who were exposed to the actual treats. Importantly, the images had to be of the treats for which the child was waiting, not of similar goodies that were irrelevant to what the child had chosen. In sum, an image of the object of desire, not the tempting object itself, made it easiest to wait.
So the effect the stimulus has on us depends on how we represent it mentally.
Give nine-year-old children compliments (for example, on their drawings), and they will choose delayed rather than immediate rewards much more often than when given negative feedback on their work.
In short, we are less likely to delay gratification when we feel sad or bad.12 Compared with happier people, those who are chronically prone to negative emotions and depression also tend to prefer immediate but less desirable rewards over delayed, more valued rewards.
The power is not in the stimulus, however, but in how it is mentally appraised: if you change how you think about it, its impact on what you feel and do changes.
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
The power resides in the prefrontal cortex, which, if activated, allows almost endless ways of cooling hot, tempting stimuli by changing how they are appraised.
To me, that finding is more critical than the long-term correlations because it points the way to strategies that can enhance self-control ability and reduce stress.
The limbic system consists of primitive brain structures located under the cortex on top of the brain stem, which developed early in our evolution. These structures regulate basic drives and emotions essential for survival, from fear and anger to hunger and sex.
Within the limbic system, the amygdala, a small almond-shaped structure (amygdala means “almond” in Latin), is especially important.
The amygdala rapidly mobilizes the body for action. It does not pause to think and reflect or worry about long-term consequences.
At birth it is already fully functional, making the infant cry when hungry or in pain.
Learning and practicing some strategies for enabling self-control early in life is a lot easier than changing hot, self-destructive, automatic-response patterns established and ingrained over a lifetime.
It is centered primarily in the prefrontal cortex (PFC).
It’s important to note that high stress attenuates the cool system and accentuates the hot system.
