The Pygmalion effect, or Rosenthal effect, refers to the phenomenon in which the greater the expectation placed upon people, often children or students and employees, the better they perform. The effect is named after Pygmalion, a Cypriot sculptor in a narrative by Ovid in Greek mythology, who fell in love with a female statue he had carved out of ivory.
The Pygmalion effect is a form of self-fulfilling prophecy, and, in this respect, people will internalize their negative label, and those with positive labels succeed accordingly. Within sociology, the effect is often cited with regard to education and social class.
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Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson (1968/1992) report and discuss the Pygmalion effect at length.[1] In their study, they showed that if teachers were led to expect enhanced performance from some children, then the children did indeed show that enhancement.
The purpose of the experiment was to support the hypothesis that reality can be influenced by the expectations of others. This influence can be beneficial as well as detrimental depending on which label an individual is assigned. The observer-expectancy effect, which involves an experimenter's unconsciously biased expectations, is tested in real life situations. Rosenthal posited that biased expectancies can essentially affect reality and create self-fulfilling prophecies as a result.
In this experiment, Rosenthal predicted that, when given the information that certain students had higher IQs than others, elementary school teachers may unconsciously behave in ways that facilitate and encourage the students' success. The prior research that motivated this study was done in 1911 by psychologists regarding the case of Clever Hans, a horse that gained notoriety because it was supposed to be able to read, spell, and solve math problems by using its hoof to answer. Many skeptics suggested that questioners and observers were unintentionally signaling Clever Hans. For instance, whenever Clever Hans was asked a question the observers' demeanor usually elicited a certain behavior from the subject that in turn confirmed their expectations. For example, Clever Hans would be given a math problem to solve, and the audience would get very tense the closer he tapped his foot to the right number, thus giving Hans the clue he needed to tap the correct number of times.
Of importance in educational research in general[says who?] is the issue of teacher effects on student progress, and how students rate those teachers. Tim O'Shea has said that in all studies where one of the variables was the teacher, the effect of different teachers was always larger than the effect of different treatments (usually the actual subject to be studied). In essence, teachers are known to have a large impact on learning faculties[says who?] but the reasons are poorly understood.
It was shown that 10 seconds of video without sound of a teacher allows students to predict the ratings the teachers will receive.[1] Hearing the sound without vision and without content (rhythm and tone of voice only) was also enough. This was viewed as strong evidence that teachers differ in ways they cannot easily or normally control, but which are very quickly perceptible, and which, at least in students' minds, determine their value as a teacher. Marsh's (1987) work shows that student ratings of teachers do relate to learning outcomes.
Feldman & Prohaska (1979) sought to discover if the pygmalion effect could occur in reverse. That is, if a student's expectation of their teacher could be transmitted to the teacher and influence their performance. In the first experiment of the study, subjects were told either positive or negative information about their teacher just before the teaching session occurred. The researchers measured how the students' expectations impacted the session by considering the scores students received on the written test that completed the session, by giving the students a survey related to teacher satisfaction, and by recording the "nonverbal behavior" of the students toward the teacher. The teacher, a cohort of the researchers, was experimentally blind to what the students thought about him/her. There were differences in all three measures based on a positive or negative expectation. Students with negative expectations "rated the lesson as being more difficult, less interesting, and less effective." Students with positive expectations scored 65.8% on the test, and those with a negative expectation scored lower, at 52.2%. In terms of nonverbal behavior, subjects leaned "forward more to good teachers than poor teachers." There was some evidence that students with a positive expectation had better eye contact with the teacher. In the second experiment of the study, Feldman and Prohaska sought to directly support the theory that "the teacher could ultimately be affected by the student's differential behavior due to expectation". In this experiment, subjects were asked to teach someone a simple lesson. The student—played by a cohort to the researchers—enacted either positive or negative nonverbal behaviors toward the subject during the teaching session. Results found that subjects who received positive nonverbal behaviors reported feeling happier and more competent than subjects whose student displayed negative non-verbal behaviors. Furthermore, outside judges who rated each subject's teaching performance found, overall, that teacher receiving positive non-verbal behaviors taught the lesson more effectively. Thus, the study found that a teacher's performance is indeed influenced by the expectations—and subsequent behavior of—their students.
The Pygmalion effect can also result from racial expectations. This effect is seen during Jane Elliott's blue-eyed versus brown-eyed discrimination exercise, where third graders were divided based on eye color. One group was given preference and regarded as "superior" because of their eye color, with the other group repeatedly being considered inferior in intelligence and learning ability. On the second day of the experiment, the groups were completely reversed, with those oppressed against one day being regarded as superior the next.
Elliott gave spelling tests to both groups on each day of the experiment. The students scored very low on the day they were racially "inferior" and very high on the day they were considered racially "superior."[2]
James Rhem, executive editor for the online National Teaching and Learning Forum, commented:[3]
Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't, you're right." -Henry Ford
In 2004, US President George W. Bush referred to "the soft bigotry of low expectations" as one of the challenges faced by disadvantaged and minority students.