Assignment 4

Of
Organizational Behavior and leadership

Submitted By:
Savyata Panthi
MBAe 4th Trimester
Section: A

Submitted To:
Mr. Madan L. Pradhan
1) What is Pygmalion Effect or Self-fulfilling prophecy?

Answer: The idea behind the Pygmalion effect is that increasing the leaders expectation of the
followers performance will result in better followers performance. Various researches have
established that employees have a greater level of success when their manager expects more of
them. If the manager believes that their employees are high producers and treat them as high
producers, the employees tend to become high producers. This is because the managers belief in
the employees tends to boost their self-efficacy.

Self-fulfilling prophecy (or, the Pygmalion effect) refers to the notion that one persons
expectation for another persons behavior can quite unwittingly become a more accurate prediction
simply for its having been made (Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968, p. vii).The Pygmalion effect is a
type of self-fulfilling prophecy where if you think something will happen, you may unconsciously
make it happen through your actions or inaction. It occurs in the workplace when a manager raises
his or her expectations for the performance of workers, and this actually results in an increase in
worker performance. Pygmalion Effect is the phenomenon whereby higher expectation leads to an
increase in performance and lower expectation leads to a decrease in performance. The Pygmalion
effect is a psychological principle that has relevance to effectively managing people. It occurs in
the workplace when a manager raises his or her expectations for the performance of workers, and
this actually results in an increase in workers performance. By the Pygmalion Effect, people
internalize their positive labels and those positive labels succeed accordingly.

For example, suppose that you are meeting Milan, a friend of your friend, Reason, for the first
time. Reason has said in the past that Milan is a little shy. According to this theory, expectation
may lead you to behave toward Milan in a way that guarantees that he behaves in a more reserve
manner. You may assume that he would not like to talk a lot about himself, so you dont ask him
a lot of questions. You may think that he is uncomfortable meeting new people, so you do not
engage him in much conversation. Your behavior makes him behave more shyly than he might
have otherwise. Your expectation (or, prophecy) about Milan is thus fulfilled as a result of that
expectation. This is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
2) What evidence of self-fulfilling prophecies have you seen lately?

Answer: I saw an evidence of self-fulfilling prophecy in my home where my I was positively

motivated to communicate smoothly with the people taking the interview for my new job. I had a
belief in myself that I could speak fluently and pitch effectively and eventually I did succeed as
well. People who tend to have a positive self-image and confidence believe they are capable of
achieving anything and they set out to achieve things more likely than others.

3) How might the Pygmalion effect be applied in the class?

Answer: Pygmalion Effect is highly applicable in the classroom as well. The teachers in the class
expects differently from different people. The behavior that is shown to students by the teachers
differs. We can clearly see the expectation of the teacher influence the behavior of the students.
If the teacher expects the student as a good performer and shows such behavior, the students will
be more motivated towards reading and as such gets to more like the expectation of a teacher.
Likewise, if the teacher expect some students as a low performer and shows the behavior of
neglecting them, then the students will not be focused on their studies and hence be the lower
performer.
If a teacher expects a student to do good in exams then, that student confidence level goes up,
focus on the studies as do good and get good marks in the exam as well and hence, performs as
expected by the teacher. Likewise, if a teacher expects the student do not do well and shows such
behavior then, at the time of exam he gets nervous and even cannot do good in what he knows
well which leads to his bad result. This definitely results what the teacher thought of.
Also, the students in the classroom rates teacher differently as per the students views. If the
students rates teacher in a positive way then, the behavior done to them is expected as positive
which leads to a positive relation. If the students rate teacher in a negative way then, they think
of negative as being neglected and more which leads to decrease in the performance of the
students.