Self-fulfilling Prophecy

Skinny_minny_mo

I've only lost a few kg's and it's not noticeable to anyone else as yet, but this has profoundly affected my behaviour. I feel more confident, more willing to go out and even received a bunch of flowers at work from some anon this week!

Which led me to think about the self-fulfilling prophecy and what a huge impact it has on us.

Some interesting experiments have been carried out by Dr. Robert Rosenthal, a Harvard University psychologist, to prove the truth of this theory, the self-fulfilling prophecy theory…

This professor went in to ghetto area of San Francisco where school children were undisciplined, non-achievers, poor students. He picked at random 24 students and divided them into 2 groups.

He put half of these children in the hands of certain teachers, telling them that these children had tremendous potential. He assigned the other 12 children to another group of teachers, telling these teachers that the children lacked any real potential, that doubtless it would be impossible to accomplish anything with them.

Then, he prescribed a series of training exercises for all these students to be put through.

6 months later he returned to check on results. The students in the charge of teachers who had been told to expect good things were doing spectacular work, while the other children were, if anything, more listless and desultory than before.

So what does this tell us?

What people think you expect of them, they will usually deliver. And what your own psyche, your own unconscious mind thinks you expect of it, it will deliver. When you hope strongly enough, expectancy goes to work for you.

Therefore, before you even achieve the success you want, you must first ‘accomplished’ it in your mind. Tell your mind that you’ll definitely achieve it and you’ll expect it to be done.

WE CAN DO IT!!!

lil_pulp

I think a better test of a self-fulfilling prophecy would have been to put all the kids in the same class with the same teacher, but to tell half of the STUDENTS that they are super-awesome geniuses and the other half that they are stupid screw-ups. The experiment you described really just proves that teachers don't always do their job well. In either case, though, it's obviously not okay to tell a child (or his teacher) that he's a loser who will never learn anything.

yuli23

Plant seeds of expectation in your mind; cultivate thoughts that anticipate achievement. Believe in yourself as being capable of overcoming all obstacles and weaknesses.” ― Norman Vincent Peale

sgha

Thanks for a very interesting post. The same goes for parents. If kids are told they are nothing but trouble and are belittled, they will act that way because they feel that is what is expected of them. Negative attention is better than no attention. I like the "I can do it!!" message, though. Remember the kids' story of the little engine that could, trying to get over the mountain? He kept saying "I think I can, I think I can" and when he went over he said " I knew I could, I knew I could." Okay, I haven't read that story in a looooong time ( lol) but it went something like that. Have confidence in yourself!!

Skinny_minny_mo

Plant seeds of expectation in your mind; cultivate thoughts that anticipate achievement. Believe in yourself as being capable of overcoming all obstacles and weaknesses.” ― Norman Vincent Peale

love it!!