What You Expect Is What You Get Stefany Holdsworth Mariah Wolf Goeun Na Lindzee Newsom James Deahl

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Self-fulfilling prophecy= if we expect something to happen in a certain way, our expectation will tend to make it so. Idea of self-fulfilling prophecy first started in 1911 with “Clever Hans.” Mr. von Osten

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Experimenter expectancy: Robert Rosenthal “Maze-Bright” rats “Maze-Dull” rats Introduced how biases can occur outside the laboratory “Pygmalion Effect”

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Method In cooperation with Oak School Administration: Grades 1-6 give IQ test Tests of General Ability: TOGA Nonverbal test so the student’s scores wouldn’t depend upon school-learned skills and one that the teachers at the school were not familiar with.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Study Design Test given at the beginning of the year. Teachers were told the students were given the “Harvard Test of Inflicted Acquisition.” The deception was important to give teachers certain expectations from the students.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Teachers were given the names of the students that had scored in the top 20% of the Harvard test. Key to the Study: Students’ names were purely chosen at random for this sample (experimental group). Only difference between these children and the others (control group) is that they had been identified by the teachers as ones that would show unusual intellectual gains.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Near the end of the school year, students were given the TOGA test once again. The degree in change of I.Q. was calculated for each child. Differences in the control and experimental group could then be examined to see if the expectancy effect had been created in a real-world setting.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Results For the entire school, the children for whom the teachers expected greater intellectual growth averaged significantly greater improvement than did the control children.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Discussion As Rosenthal suspected, the teacher’s expectations of their students’ behavior became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Rosenthal suggested the importance of why the self-fulfilling prophecy was not demonstrated in the higher grade levels.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory 1. Younger children are more malleable or “transformable.” Even if they are not, teachers have a tendency to believe that they are. 2. Younger students don’t have as well-established reputations.

3. Younger children may be more easily influenced and more susceptible to the subtle and unintentional processes that teachers use to communicate performance expectation to them. 4. Lower-grade teachers may communicate their expectancies more often than higher-grade teachers.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Significance of Findings The real importance of the study relates to the potential long-lasting effects of teachers’ expectations on the scholastic performance of students. Leads to the question of the fairness of I.Q. tests.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Subsequent Research Chaiken, Sigler, and Derlega (1974) Teachers had been informed that certain students were extremely bright. Recorded classrooms by video camera to detect subtle ways which influenced the brighter students’ performance (i.e. eye contact, favorable reactions from other students, and more constructive comments from teachers)

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Recent Applications Rosenthal’s theory of “interpersonal expectancies” has exerted its influence in numerous areas other than education. 1996 and 1997: over 50 scientific articles citing Rosenthal’s “Pygmalion” research.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Recent Applications Madon, Jussim, and Eccles (1997): (Madon is a professor at ISU and is currently researching self-fulfilling prophecies in educational settings. This study found that low-achieving children were significantly more likely to be influenced by teachers’ expectations than high-achievers.

Intelligence, Cognition and Memory Recent Applications Discussion- How these studies might effect: Racial profiling Sex biases Child achievement in the home Socio-economic status

Discussion Do you think it’s possible that some children’s learning abilities may have been stunted due to an unsatisfactory test score, leading to negative or insufficient attention from the teacher? How would you react if you were the teacher and you were given I.Q. scores? Would you treat students differently according to their scores? Do you think the self-fulfilling prophecy is true?