Synonyms

Delay of gratification; Reward discounting; Self-control; Self-regulation

Definition

Academic delay of gratification refers to students’ postponement of immediately available opportunities to satisfy impulses in favor of pursuing important academic rewards or goals that are temporally remote but ostensibly more valuable.

Description

Bembenutty and Karabenick [4, 5] develop the concept of academic delay of gratification to apply the general construct of delay of gratification to learning contexts. This theoretical approach extends the work of Mischel [6] on delay gratification. Bembenutty and Karabenick [4] demonstrated extensive associations between academic delay of gratification and students’ achievement motivation tendencies and use of learning strategies with a scale specifically designed to assess students’ tendencies to delay gratification in an academic context (academic delay of gratification scale – ADOGS; [4]). Students reporting greater preference to delay of gratification in an academic context reported also high academic motivation (e.g., higher in self-efficacy and intrinsic interest in learning). They are more likely to use cognitive (e.g., critical thinking, elaboration, organization, and rehearsal), metacognitive, and resource management strategies (e.g., effort management, time and study environmental control, and help seeking). Students’ amount of time dedicated to study and the effective structuring of their study environment, as well as their efforts to persist on tasks are directly related to academic delay of gratification. Further, students more likely to delay gratification also reported higher levels of persistence when tasks were less interesting or more difficult [1].

Students’ preferences for academic delay gratification are related to self-regulatory processes considered essential to academic success [7]. Self-regulation is an essential component of development. Individuals use diverse strategies to facilitate the implementation of intentions and goals. These strategies may be especially important when alternatives to studying become available. When individuals experience internal or external distraction from enacting intentions, such self-regulatory strategies as selective attention and the control of encoding, motivation, emotion, the environment, and information processing are assumed to help them remain task focused. An example of the relevance of control strategies for delay of gratification is the selective attention that children employ to avoid visual contact with attractive alternatives to the delayed reward [6]. Similarly, the studying student could avoid thinking about the positive consequences of attending the party and, using motivational control, focus on the negative consequences of not studying for the impending exam. Students who delay are also more likely to have available and use self-regulated learning strategies.

Motivational analyses of academic delay of gratification include such factors as the relevance, value, and expectancy for immediate reward versus delayed reward options. Bembenutty [3] found that willingness to delay gratification depends on an individual’s expectancies, beliefs, goals, and values. Expectancy and value influence the decisions that learners will make regarding stay home studying for a test or going out to have fun with their friend even when the homework may not be completed. The expectancy and value placed on the delay task as well as on the nondelay alternative will determine the feasibility of attaining a delayed reward. Students’ preference for academic delay of gratification is a function of their expected value of alternative courses of action. Whether the student delays gratification (in order to study) would depend on the likelihood of successful exam performance given that she studies, compared to that of attending the party, and the degree of interest, utility, importance and cost of these alternatives [2].

Relevance to Childhood Development

Children’s preference for academic delay of gratification is an essential component of their development and maturity. To be responsible members of the society, children need to acquire the skills and willingness to postpone immediate available reward that are temporarily available but which are less desirable. Learning to prioritize between what is more valuable and conducive to reach long-term goals is a desirable social element that parents and teachers could instill on children. Children needs to learn the necessary self-regulatory skills to learn academic materials, but they also need to develop the ability to engage in goal setting, selecting strategies, monitor goal attainment, engage in effort regulation, time management, and self-evaluation in order to reach their academic potentials. Longitudinal studies have shown that children’s ability to delay gratification positively predict adult’s self-regulatory competencies.