“HYPEROPIA.”

“HYPEROPIA.” I have posted (for example, here) about the problems that people have in deferring gratification. But I also posted here about my brother Elmer’s insight of forty years ago that one can store up happy memories and that students studying hard can be thought of as grasshoppers in the fable, while students partying can be thought of as ants storing up happy memories. Now, this article in Harvard Magazine reports on research into what the researchers (Professors Anat Keinan and Ran Kivetz) call “hyperopia”—”the habit of overestimating the benefits one will receive in the future from making responsible decisions now.” One of their findings is that some students in the study regretted foregoing pleasure more and more with the passage of time. In this article about the research, John Tierney quotes somebody who indulges in gratification as thinking in terms of saving up memories: “When I look back at my life,…I like remembering myself happy. So if it makes me happy, it’s worth it.”