experiment

The Marshmallow Test
career

Are Marshmallows a Fair Indicator of Success?

If you failed the marshmallow test when you were a kid, chances are you won't see success, according to a study by psychologist Walter Mischel.
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If you failed the marshmallow test when you were a kid, chances are you won't see success, according to a study by psychologist Walter Mischel. Researchers place the white, fluffy sweet on a plate and tell the kids to either eat the marshmallow now or wait for a moment to eat two marshmallows. It's apparently a great indicator of impulse control, which is a good predictor of SAT scores. In fact, those who chose the delayed gratification path scored 210 more points than those who succumbed to the allures of the yummy marshmallows. Do you think this is a smart test to measure a person's chances of succeeding?

Check out the cute video below of a professor who carried out this experiment:

Would You Ever Job Swap With Your Partner?
career

Would You Ever Job Swap With Your Partner?

In an admittedly gutsy career move, Susan Barton will be taking over her husband's job at Slate for two weeks.
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In an admittedly gutsy career move, Susan Barton will be taking over her husband's job at Slate for two weeks. The experiment, a kind of real-world take on Freaky Friday — and aptly titled Freaky Fortnight — details the adventures of this 30-something mom and her husband switching roles — Susan taking to the office at Slate as an editor, and her husband taking the reigns at home to care for their two children.

It's a brave attempt at experiencing daily life in someone else's shoes. At a certain point, our own routines have become second nature, and it's impossible to know exactly where another career path would take us, how it would affect us, and how we would fare. So, despite the occasional wishful thinking to experience life as a movie star or dream job of your choice, tell me, would you ever seriously consider switching jobs with your partner?

TV Dinners: South Park - Microwaved Peeps
candy

TV Dinners: South Park - Microwaved Peeps

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Last night the bf was flipping through the channels and landed on a new episode of South Park. The episode itself poked fun at Easter in a Da Vinci Code style. The weirdest thing is I was actually writing a post about how we microwaved Peeps when, what? What is that? They are microwaving Peeps on South Park?!?

Sometimes the universe is wild like that.

So, for today's TV Dinner, I present microwaved Peeps. However, unlike the ones on South Park, ours did not expand to the point where they took over the building and burst out all the windows - but they did expand. We ran three tests and then tried a Peep joust (we didn't have toothpicks so we improvised). Unfortunately, the microwave in our office has a weird screen in front of the window, so we really couldn't see in. This meant no fun video for us (we tried, it looked terrible), so we'll have to show you what happened with still photographs instead.

We put the first Peep in for 15 seconds, it puffed up a tiny bit and deflated into a pile of sticky goo. I preferred the 15 second taste to the 0 second taste. It was warm and a tiny bit more flavorful. I was also surprised because it somehow still managed to look like a bird.

Our tests also ran at 30 seconds, 45 seconds and then a jousting event:

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To see the rest of our microwaved Peep adventure (Peep jousting!), and a clip from South Park (while it lasts),  read more