JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL CHILD PSYCHOLOGY 21, 12-24 t 1976)

Delay of Gratification in Children: The Effects of

Training under Fixed, Decreasing and
Increasing Delay of Reward

ALEXANDER NEWMAN’ AND FREDERICK H. KANFER~

University of Cincinnati

The effect of fixed, gradually decreasing, or increasing delay of reward in

discimination learning on later delay of gratification was investigated. In
discrimination training, employing a correction procedure, a candy reward
was delivered either after 0. 10, 20, 40 or 60 set fixed delay; or after 60 set
in the first block of trials and decreased in successive block; or reward was
immediate in the first block of trials and delay was gradually increased to 60
sec. In the delay of gratification tests, subjects could press a button imme-
diately to receive a small reward (one candy or a cheap toy) or delay pressing
and receive an increasingly larger reward (more candy or a better toy).
Learning was not significantly affected by either fixed or decreasing delays.
Increasing delays resulted in faster learning than decreasing delays. The in-
creasing delay group demonstrated superior delay of gratification on both
tests. Fixed delay groups did not differ significantly among themselves, nor
from the decreasing delay group. The effectiveness of exposure to increasing
delays in facilitating delay of gratification was interpreted as due to either
the acquisition of coping responses or the extinction of frustration.

A critical task of the socialization process is to teach the child to

voluntarily tolerate delays in satisfaction of his needs. The process by
which such tolerance can be facilitated has been called self-control. It
has been described by Skinner (1953) as the initiation of a response
chain which reduced the probability of making a response that results
in immediate positive and delayed aversive consequences.
Recent research on self-control training has focused mainly on studying
the effectiveness of training persons to introduce various specific con-
trolling responses early in a response chain, thereby modifying the

This article is based on a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements

for the Ph.D. degree by the first author under direction of the second author at the
University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1973. The authors wish to acknowledge the
assistance of N. Bray, P. Karoly, and E. Neimark in the design and execution of the
study, and of the principals of the elementary schools, Messr. Consoli. Richman,
Schlegel and Zakarian for making their facilities available to us.
* Now at Hunter College. Requests for reprints should be sent to Alexander Newman.
Department of Psychology, Hunter College, 695 Park Avenue, New York, New York.
10021.
* Now at the University of Illinois. Urbana-Champaign, Illinois.

Copyright 0 1976 by Academic Press. Inc.

All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.
 DELAY OF GRATIFICATION IN CHILDREN 13

probability of later elements of the previously well established chain

(cf. Kanfer, 1970, 1975; Thoresen & Mahoney, 1974). For example,
persons have been taught to establish competing responses by narrowing
stimulus control (Ferster, Nurnberger, & Levitt, 1962), by self-instruc-
tions (Hartig & Kanfer, 1973; Meichenbaum & Goodman, 1971;
O’Leary, 1968) or self-monitoring (Kanfer & Phillips, 1970; Kazdin,
1974). Persons have also been taught imaginal or verbal responses de-
signed to bring long term aversive consequence into the tempting
situation (e.g., Cautela, 1969; Homme, 1965) and achieve increased
tolerance of delay of gratification.
One approach that has remained unexplored is the manipulation of
temporal reinforcement contigencies in the person’s history in order to
increase the tolerance for delayed gratification. In Walden Two,
Skinner (1948) outlined a program that essentially aimed to build in-
creased tolerance by gradually increasing the delay interval between the
response and the reward (pp. 107-l 11). While there is much research
on the variables that influence a child to decide between immediate
and long range consequences and on the activities during the delay
phase that might facilitate delay tolerance (e.g., Mischel, 1973) there
is no known study that examines directly the effects of training with
delayed rewards on behavior in subsequent delay of gratification situa-
tions. A test of the effectiveness of Skinner’s proposed program was the
primary concern of the present study. A methodological problem in
delay training was the secondary focus of the design.
It is generally assumed that delay reduces the potency of a reward,
and delay gradients in animal studies have supported this assumption
(Logan, 1960; Renner, 1964). At the human level the effects of delay
of reward are less clear. It has been shown that fixed delay of reward
retards discrimination learning in children (e.g., Berth, 1970; Fagan &
Wityrol, 1966; Hetherington & Ross, 1967; Setterington & Walters,
1964; Terre11 & Ware, 1961). On the other hand, other investigators
found no significant effect of delay of reward in children (e.g., Brackbill
& Kappy, 1962; Erickson & Lipsitt, 1960: Etzel & Wright, 1964). While
several authors have attempted to account for these discrepant findings
(e.g., Terrell, 1965; Ramey & Ourth, 1971) no convincing argument has
been proposed and the results of studies examining the effects of
delay of reward on discrimination learning have remained inconclusive.
Most commonly, delay of reward is confounded with delay of knowledge
of results, post knowledge of results interval, and inter-trial interval.
In studying the utility of delay of reward training, it is therefore also
necessary to examine various patterns and durations of delay in training,
since they may differ in their effects on later delay of gratification.
Further, with knowledge of results and delay of reward clearly separated
and with constant intertrial interval (providing also a constant post
14 NEWMAN AND KANFER

knowledge of results interval), the effects of decreasing, increasing, or

fixed delay intervals alone could be directly examined.
The main purpose of the present study was to compare the effects of
fixed, gradually decreasing, and gradually increasing delays of reward in
discrimination learning on later delay of gratification. To test the generality
of the procedure, the temptation situation involved two different delayed
rewards (candy or toys), and samples from two different socioeconomic
classes were selected. Choice of different socioeconomic classes was
based on the suggestion by Mischel (1973) and others that a child reared
in low socioeconomic urban environments may respond differently to
delay of gratification than the middle class child. A secondary purpose
of the present study, related to the methodological requirements for
pretraining under delay, was to explore the effects of fixed, increasing,
and decreasing delay of reward on learning a discrimination task.

METHOD
Subjects
The subjects were 150 male six year old first grade children. Half of
the subjects were obtained from Public Schools in West New York, New
Jersey and the other half from Public Schools in Fort Lee, New Jersey.
The per capita income of residents of West New York is $2,277 and
per capita income of residents of Fort Lee is $6,402 (U.S. Bureau of
the Census, 1970). The West New York sample, in addition, were all
English speaking Cuban-Americans, born in the United States.

Apparatus
The child sat at a table facing (1) a 30.48 x 30.48 cm frosted glass
screen in a white frame which was rear illuminated by a Kodak Car-rouse1
Projector Model 850, (2) a grey chassis box on which were mounted
four push buttons which could be illuminated with a yellow, red, blue,
or green light, and (3) a display containing a Gerbrands Model D 700
candy dispenser. In the delay of gratification test, the child was given
a small grey chassis box with a push button switch. A clear bottle
containing candy was placed in front of the subjects, but out of their
reach. In both phases the reward consisted of candy buckshots, 3 mm in
diameter. The toys available on the delay of gratification task included
a small balloon, a plastic flute, a car, boat, and plane, a bag of 20
marbles, a whistle, a bag of plastic animals, and a frisbee.
During the training and test phases, the experimenter operated the
equipment from an adjacent room. He controlled the colored light
that illuminated the push button display and the location of the correct
push button for that trial. Projection of animal slides, delay of reward
intervals, and intertrial intervals was controlled by two Electromed
 DELAY OF GRATIFICATION IN CHILDREN 15

Timers. The waiting interval on the self-control tests was recorded by a

Lafayette Digital Stop Clock.

Procedure
Discrimination training. The experimenter, a white male graduate
student was introduced to the class as a representative of a toy company.
Children were told that the experimenter’s job was to visit different
schools and to play different games with boys so they could help him
find out how much fun the games were. Subjects were selected arbitrarily
by the teacher. The experimenter then brought them individually to
the experimental room. Each child was seated in front of the chassis
box containing the push buttons, the reinforcement dispenser, and the
screen. He was then told that a picture of an animal would appear on
the screen; at the same time the four push buttons would light up in
different colors. The subject was asked to make believe that the animal
on the screen was lost.
The experimenter then illuminated the buttons and asked the subject
to name the four colors. Subjects were told to imagine that each ani-
mal lived in a different colored house. The only way that the animal
could go home was if the child pressed the right color. Then the lights
would go out, and the subject would receive a candy which he could eat
right away. He was told that if he pressed the wrong button he should
try again until he found the correct button. Thus, in the beginning he
would be guessing but he should later try to choose the right color
on his very first try. Finally, the child was told that the position of the
colors would vary. While administering these instructions, the experi-
menter was unaware to which particular group the subject had been
assigned. The experimenter asked the subject to repeat the rules of the
game, then summarized the rules and went to the adjacent monitoring
room.
The four animals used were a zebra, elephant, duck, and cub. The
four colors were red, green, blue, and yellow. Four by four Greco-Latin
squares of the combinations of the animals and of the colors were com-
puted, so that for each animal the correct response was a different color.
Replications of 15 subjects were conducted with each of the four combina-
tions so that after eight replications each combination of color-animal
was repeated twice. In the ninth and tenth replications the combination
of color-animal was randomly selected.
Color position was established in a similar manner. The 24 possible
color position combinations were formed into six 4 x 4 Greco-Latin
squares so that in each block each color appeared in every position.
Five of the six squares were then randomly assigned to the five blocks of
four trials.
Experimental groups. Of the fifteen subjects in each replication, five
16 NEWMAN AND KANFER

were randomly assigned to thejxed deluy group, five to the decreasing

delay group, and five to the increasing delay group. The five subjects
of the fixed delay groups were randomly assigned to each of five fixed delay
conditions so that reward was delivered on every trial after 0, 10, 20, 40,
or 60 set following the correct response. In the decreasing delay group,
subjects were rewarded 60 set after the correct response in the first
block of four trials, 40 set in the second block, 20 set in the third, 10 set
in the fourth, and 0 set in the last block. In the increasing delay group, the
subjects were given 0 set delay for the first block of four trials, 10 set
delay for the second block, 20 set delay for the third block, 40 set for the
fourth block, and 60 set for the last block. In all cases, the intertrial
(i.e., response-stimulus) interval was 70 sec. Thus, as soon as the sub-
ject made the correct response, the lights which illuminated the push
buttons went out and the delay of reward period began. The number of
correct responses on the child’s first attempt on a trial was recorded.
All subjects were given 20 trials.
Delay tolerance. This test began immediately after the last trial.
The experimenter returned to the room and told the subject that in the
next game he could get more candy. He was then given a small box
containing a push button and was told that when he pressed the button
he would get some more candy. He was told that it takes time for candy
to fill the machine so that the longer he waited before pressing the
button, the more candy he would get. Consequently, if he pressed the
button right after he had said “go” the child would get only a small
amount of candy. But if he waited before pressing the button, he would
get more. The subject was asked to repeat the rules for this game. A clear
bottle containing candy was placed on the table but out of the subject’s
reach. The experimenter said that he was going outside the door and when
he said “ready,” the subject should say “go” and the game would begin.
The experimenter immediately left the room, said “ready” and when the
subject said “go” the Digital Stop Clock was started. When the subject
pressed the button the clock stopped and 10 candies were delivered in
the reinforcement dispenser.
The experimenter then returned, placed the toys on the table in front
of the subject, and said that they would play a similar kind of game, but
instead of candy, they would play for toys. It was explained that the toys
were all different and of variable values. As before, when the experi-
menter said “ready” and when the subject said “go” the game began.
If the subject pressed the button right away he would get the worst toy.
If he waited before he pressed the button he would receive a better
toy. The longer he waited, the better the toy he would get. Again, the
subject was asked to repeat the rules of this game; the experimenter
left the room and said “ready”; the subject said “go”; the experimenter
activated the Digital Stop Clock; the clock stopped when the subject
 DELAY OF GRATIFICATION IN CHILDREN 17

pressed the button; and the experimenter returned to give the subject the
toy.
In both delay tolerance tests (candy and toys) the dependent variable
was the interval between the child saying “go” and his pressing the
button. If the subject waited 300 seconds the experimenter entered the
room, terminated the trial, and gave the child candies or toys, respectively.
As the subjects were given the toys, they were asked not to tell their
friends about the game. All subjects were asked how they enjoyed the
game and all subjects received praise from the experimenter for their
performance.

RESULTS
The main experimental question concerned the effects of exposure to
fixed, decreasing, or increasing intervals of delay of reward on later
tolerance of gratification delay. It was expected that the increasing delay
condition would yield the greatest tolerance.

Effect of Fixed, Increasing, and Decreasing Delay of Reward on

Delay Tolerance
Since no significant differences in delay of gratification were found
among the fixed delay groups (F(l, 40) = 2.29, NS), the data were
pooled and then compared to the increasing and decreasing delay groups.
Figure 1 presents the mean durations of delay in asking for the reward
on the candy and toy trials, for the fixed, decreasing, and increasing
delay groups. On both delay tolerance tests, prior exposure to in-
creasing delays of reward clearly resulted in superior delay of gratifica-
tion. An analysis of variance of the delay tolerance scores showed that
the increasing delay group was significantly superior to the fixed and
decreasing delay groups (F(2, 144) = 59.49, p < .OOl). No significant
differences were obtained for subjects from the two socioeconomic
classes (F(l, 144) = .07). Subjects waited significantly longer on the
second test (involving toys) than on the first (candy) test (F(1, 144)
= 12.28, p < .OOl). The effects of prior training with increasing delay of
candy reward not only extended to the second test involving a non-
consumable reward (i.e., toys), but were even stronger on that test.
Thus the major hypothesis, that gradually increasing delay of reward
will facilitate delay of gratification, was confirmed.

Effect of Fixed, Decreasing, and Increasing Delay of Reward on

Learning
Since delay of reward was a between-subjects variable in the fixed
delay groups and a within-subject condition in the increasing and de-
18 NEWMAN AND KANFER

FIG. 1. Resistance to temptation of candy and toys as a function of training procedure.

creasing delay groups, separate analyses were performed to assess the

effects of (a) fixed delay of reward, (b) fixed vs. decreasing delay, (c)
fixed vs. increasing delay, and (d) decreasing vs. increasing delay.
In order to compare the effects of fixed delay of reward, a between-
subjects condition, to decreasing or increasing delay of reward, within-
subject condition, the procedure recommended by Grice (1966) was
employed. In this procedure k groups of within-subjects are run but
only the data from one treatment from each of these groups is used.
“The within row is then filled with data from independent groups, but
is still, in effect, a within condition because all of the subjects have ex-
perienced all of the treatments. Statistically, however, the experiment
may be analyzed in a straight-forward manner as an independent group
design.” (Grice, 1966, p. 490).
In the present study, subjects were run in 10 replications with 15 sub-
jects in each replication which included one of each of the fixed delay
conditions, five decreasing delay conditions, and five increasing delay
conditions. The order of fixed delay conditions had been randomized
during the initial run. In the comparison of fixed and decreasing delay,
the five subjects in the decreasing delay group in each replication were
randomly assigned to one of five comparison groups so that each de-
creasing delay comparison group was to be compared to a fixed delay
group for that block of trials in which they experienced the identical
 DELAY OF GRATIFICATION IN CHILDREN 19

delay. Similarly, in the comparison of fixed and increasing delay, only

that block of trials in which the subjects were exposed to the same
delay interval was used. Thus, for comparison to the fixed and increasing
delay groups at 0 set delay, only the data from the first trial block were
used, at 10 set delay, only the data from the second trial block were
used, etc. Thus, delay and trial block were perfectly confounded with a
positive correlation of 1. In the previous analysis, in contrast, delay
and trial blocks were perfectly confounded with a negative correlation
of 1. Thus, the statistical design in both cases is a completely randomized
factorial design with three independent variables: (a) Sequence of delay
(fixed versus decreasing or increasing), (b) socioeconomic class, and (c)
delay (0, 10, 20, 40 or 60 set) which is perfectly confounded with trial
blocks (e.g., the last trial block is that block in which subjects in both
decreasing and fixed delay groups were both exposed to 0 delay, etc.)
No significant differences in number of correct responses on the first
try were found (a) among the fixed delay groups (F(4, 40) = .75), (b)
between fixed and decreasing delay groups (F(1, 80) = .05), and (c)
between fixed and increasing delay groups (F(l, 80) = 2.58). However,
significant difference between increasing and decreasing delay groups
was obtained (F(1, 96) = 5.69, p < .05). The number of correct re-
sponses on the first try increased significantly over trials for the com-
bined fixed delay groups (F(4, 160) = 2.85, p < .005). No significant
groups by trials interactions were obtained for (a) fixed delay groups
(F(16, 160) = 1.06), (b) fixed and decreasing delay groups (F(4, 80)
= .14), (c) fixed and increasing delay groups (F(4, 80) = .86), or (d)
decreasing and increasing delay groups (F(4,384) = .57). Findings on the
socioeconomic class variable were not significant in any of the analyses
of variance for the fixed delay group (F(1, 40) = .25), or for decreasing
and increasing delay groups (F(1, 140) = .31).
In summary, fixed and decreasing delay of reward failed to signifi-
cantly affect learning. Increased delay of reward resulted in more
correct responses on the first try than decreasing delay of reward.

DISCUSSION
Delay Tolerance
The major finding of the present study is that practice on a discrimina-
tion task with increasing delay of reward significantly increases voluntary
delay of gratification. However, the exact process by which increasing
delay sequences facilitates delay tolerance is not completely clear from
the present analysis. At least two lines of recent research lead to testable
hypotheses which predict the utility of training under increasing delays.
In one view, delay of reward is considered a time-out from positive
reinforcement, and thereby, an aversive event (e.g. Leitenberg, 1965).
20 NEWMAN AND KANFER

In order to make the delay period less aversive, subjects utilize a

variety of coping responses. For example, Mischel (1973) has observed
that during self-imposed delay of reward, children often spontaneously
emit such coping responses as physical and cognitive avoidance of the
temptation cues or self-reinforcement for waiting. In increasing delay
training, in the present study, subjects were first exposed to immediate
reinforcement, and then when a delay of reward interval was intro-
duced, subjects emitted coping responses. When the candy of reward
was eventually delivered, it should reinforce the immediately preceding
coping responses. Thus, as the delay increased, the frequency of coping
responses should tend to increase. In the subsequent delay of gratification
test, it is suggested that the subjects employed these same coping
responses to reduce the aversiveness of delay.
Our results may also be explained by an extension of Amsel’s frus-
trative nonreward theory (1958, 1962, 1967) which posits that the intro-
duction of partial or delayed reward elicits an aversive conditioned
emotional response called frustration. If partial or delayed reward
training is carried long enough, frustration dissipates because of counter-
conditioning to the instrumental response. It is suggested that by
exposing subjects to gradually increasing delays of reward, the aversive-
ness of the delay should be reduced, thereby facilitating delay of gratifica-
tion. In support of this view, Terre11 & Ware (1963) found that during
early training, children produced greater GSRs when reward was
delayed but at the end of training, children emitted greater GSRs when
reward was immediate.
A number of differential predictions emerge from the two theoretical
orientations. In general terms, it would be interesting to explore
the effects of keeping the coping response constant and varying the
degree of frustration by the manipulation of such variables as ex-
pectancy, justification of delay or nonreward, salience of cues, etc.
The frustration extinction view would predict that those subjects
who have had training with increasing delays, will display greater
delay tolerance, while the coping response view would be forced to pre-
dict no differences between groups. For example, it has been demon-
strated that the presence of the tempting stimuli (e.g., candy) reduces
delay tolerance unless the subject physically avoids the tempting stimuli
(e.g., Mischel & Ebbesen, 1970), or cognitively avoids the stimuli by
not thinking about the temptation (e.g., Mischel, Ebbesen, & Zeiss,
1972) or by congnitive transformations focussing on nonconsummatory
qualities of the rewards (Mischel & Baker, 1975). Thus, the coping
response view would suggest that successful delay of gratification
depends in part on the subject’s ability to avoid the tempting cues.
The frustration extinction view suggests that subjects’ reactions to the
tempting reward can be modified so that avoidance is not necessary.
 DELAY OF GRATIFICATION IN CHILDREN 21

Thus after training with increasing delays, when the temptation cues
are salient, cognitive avoidance or cognitive transformations will not
significantly increase delay tolerance. Secondly, according to the frus-
tration view (a) interpolated aggression during the waiting period should
facilitate delay tolerance and (b) the increasing delay sequence would
result in the least spontaneously emitted aggression during a waiting
period.
Conversely, it would be interesting to compare the effectiveness of
the various types of coping responses which have been found to facili-
tate the delay tolerance, using techniques by which those variables
which have been found to influence the amount of frustration are kept
constant. Finally, it would be interesting to explore the interaction of
frustration and coping responses. For example, Ebbesen, Bowers,
Phillips, and Snyder (1975) have found that manipulation of a number
of variables which presumably modulate frustration (e.g., salience of
liking, contrast of attractiveness of available toys and the forbidden
toy) affects the quality of a coping response (i.e. devaluation of the for-
bidden toy). The frustration extinction view would predict that in the
increasing delay group, subjects’ evaluation of the temptation would be
less influenced by these variables.
One may argue that increasing delay of reward in training later pro-
duced longer self-imposed delay of reward merely because the sub-
ject has learned that the tasks involve waiting. This explanation would
predict that subjects who received rewards after a fixed 60 or 40 set
should wait longer than those who received their reward immediately
or after 10 sec. The lack of significant differences in self-imposed de-
lay in the fixed groups speaks against this explanation.
The addition of a second delay-tolerance test using toys was intended
only to see whether the training effects would be maintained even when
the reinforcers were changed, although the possibility of confounding with
test order existed. A priori, it might be thought that since candy was
used in training, use of the same reinforcer in testing could mediate or
magnify the effect. The results clearly demonstrate the persistence of
the training effects even when the reward was changed.
Reward Delay and Learning
A second finding of the present study is that fixed delay of reward did
not result in significantly slower learning than immediate reward al-
though the parameters were chosen on the basis of critiques of earlier
studies, to maximize the opportunities for an effect (i.e., subjects were
first graders, the problems were a relatively difficult four stimulus
discrimination, and delays were longer than previously used). A critical
difference between the present study and many earlier ones is that de-
lay of reward was not confounded with delay of knowledge of results,
22 NEWMAN AND KANFER

post knowledge of results interval, and intertrial interval. Therefore,

in previous studies, the supposed delay of effect on learning may have
been a function only of the delay of the information component or
reward. When the informative function of reinforcement was eliminated
by supplying immediate feedback, the delayed incentive function of rein-
forcement was not sufficient to affect discrimination learning.
Emphasizing the empirical procedures, Capaldi (1967) has shown in the
case of partial reinforcement, that the reward-nonreward sequence is an
important variable in accounting for the partial reinforcement effect.
Translated to the case of varied delay of reinforcement, these findings
are consistent with the present result of faster learning for an increasing
than a decreasing sequence. Decreasing delay of reward, however, did
not significantly affect learning.
Emphasizing the process, Amsel’s Frustrative Nonreward Theory
would explain the superiority of an increasing sequence over a decreasing
sequence in the following manner. Increasing delays presumably caused
increasing frustration and since responding was paired with reinforce-
ment, frustration became counter-conditioned. The reduction in frustra-
tion thus resulted in faster learning in the increasing delay group.
The implication of the present findings for educational techniques
toward development of self-control are clear. In addition to providing
controlling responses during a delay interval, as reported by Meichenbaum
& Goodman (1971), Mischel, Ebbesen, & Zeiss (1972), Hartig & Kanfer
(1973), direct training for tolerance of delay (as suggested in Skinner,
1948) also appears to be a fruitful avenue to explore.

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RECEIVED November 22. 1974; REVISED March 24, 1975