IMAGINATION CAN RESTRAIN IMPULSIVENESS

Pacific Standard:

As Washington watchers are well aware, bad decisions are often the product of impulsiveness. Whether it’s our choice of what to eat for lunch or our nation’s policy on climate change, we too often make choices that produce immediate gratification, but ultimately produce harm.

Psychological research suggests this is, to some degree, innate. Experiments have shown that small kids who can’t resist reaching for a marshmallow have less successful adult lives, due to that inability to resist temptation in favor of pursing long-term goals.

But according to a new study, there may be a simple way to focus our minds on the bigger picture. It finds making a subtle mental shift—choosing not between two concrete options, but rather between two sequences of events—can stimulate your imagination and reveal the value of waiting.

Read the whole story: Pacific Standard