Do High Expectations Really Matter?

I’ve been reading Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman. You’ll probably remember the story I’m going to share with you.  Researchers wanted to study the effects of teachers demonstrating high expectations with a group of students who had been “tested” and shown to be of higher than average intelligence.  Researchers encouraged the teachers to pay more attention to these students, encourage them more if they struggled, and of course, praise their efforts and achievement often.  It’s called the Pygmalion effect.  And it isn’t only for students.  

Beware: The effects of low expectations are exactly what you'd expect.  This is called the Golem effect.  If we have low expectations of someone, we are going to distance ourselves from them, we are not going to smile at them. If we don’t believe in what they can do, how can they believe it themselves?  Due to the ethics of this type of research on humans, there isn't much.  But it JUST MAKES SENSE.  

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