The Power of Expectation

How the Expectations of Others Affects the Way We Perceive Ourselves

In 1965, a collaborative study was conducted between Harvard University and a school district in San Francisco where they wanted to see how student performance was affected by teacher expectations. In the study, a small group of students were randomly to a group of what they called “growth spurters.” The teachers were then told that these students had scored very high on The Harvard Test of Inflected Acquisition test, which the researchers said indicated that these students had a very high I.Q. and were expected to have extremely high academic performance. In reality, the test didn’t exist and the children identified as belonging to this exceptional group were just average students picked at random.

The results were fascinating. The students in the “spurters” group showed a 50% increase in their IQ scores and academic performance compared to their classmates. Interestingly, this effect was seen primarily during grades 1-3, which is the age range when children are first forming their sense of self. The study showed that regardless of race, sex, or economic status, a child could outperform their peers if the teachers believed that they had high potential. When the researchers dug into this phenomenon further, they discovered that when teachers believed that a student had a high degree of potential that they interacted with them differently. They talked to them like they were very intelligent and paid extra attention to them.

In 1980, a fascinating study was done at Dartmouth College that has become known as “the facial scar study.” In the study a group of women had a scar applied to their face by make-up artists to study how other people would react to their visual disfigurement. So, the women in the study had these scars applied to their faces and shown what they looked like in a mirror. Just before the women with the facial scars met were supposed to meet with strangers, the make-up artists told the women that they were going to “touch up the make up” to make sure the scars looked as realistic as possible. In reality, the make-up artists removed the scars without the women knowing. In other words, the women only thought they had scars on their face, when in fact, they did not.

The results were fascinating. The women who thought they had the facial scars reported that others stared at their scars, talked to them differently, were patronizing, and found them to be less attractive. Those who observed the behavior between the women and others noted that the women seemed to be more tense and irritable than those who did not believe that they had a scar.

Expectations Impact Our Experience

What these two studies demonstrated is that the expectations that others have on us will impact how we perceive ourselves, and how we perceive ourselves will impact the way in which we perceive our world. If we grow up in an environment where the adults in our lives have low expectations of us or treat us as though we are dumb or don’t matter, we will not be encouraged to stretch, grow, and actualize our potential. To make matters worse, the lens through which we perceive the way other people treat us will also become distorted and will often reinforce our internalized negative perception of ourselves.

When we look at problems like poor academic performance in inner city kids, high levels of depression and anxiety among children and young adults, and even the current mental health crisis in adults, we have to look at how our expectations of them affecting how they perceive themselves. I have heard so many teachers say things like “oh these kids come from a tough background, so it is harder for them” or “they will never go to college, so we just want to get them through school so they can get a job.” How do you think that will affect the development of the child when the adults around them treat them as though they have no potential? It is no wonder why there are cities in the United States where 0% of the children are reading at grade level.

What about us adults? How have the expectations of others while we were growing up impacted how we perceive ourselves? How do these perceptions affect how we experience life? There is an old saying that we spend 18 years getting through our childhood, and then the rest of our lives trying to recover from it. While this is a bit of a tongue-in-cheek poke at the way our past affects our present experience, there is some truth to it—at least for many people. Like the women in the facial scar study, many of us carry perceptions of ourselves that have a negative impact on the way in which we relate to the world around us and keep us from being able to fully realize our potential.

Seeing Ourselves Accurately

The question that you may want to ask yourself is this: “Where is my imagined facial scar?” In other words, where may you be perceiving a flaw in yourself where none actually exists? Do you feel unlovable or unworthy? Do you feel like you can never do anything right, or that your ideas are stupid? Do you feel broken or that there is something wrong with you?

If so, you are not alone. I often struggle with these things, too. So do a lot of people. The key to keep in mind is that just because something feels real does not make it real. Just because we feel unlovable doesn’t mean that we are. Just because we feel like we can never do anything right doesn’t make it true. These feelings are just artifacts of growing up surrounded by adults who didn’t have healthy expectations of us and are not based in any objective truth. Just like the women who believed that they had the facial scar mistakenly perceived other people as treating them differently, our own beliefs about ourself will impact our experience in life.