The Pygmalion Effect, as stated by Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson (1968/1992), is the succes or the fail of someone influenced by the expectations upon that person. It's also called the teacher-expectancy effect. For instance, a student that is put on more success expectations will be more likely to succeed that a student that is expected to fail.
I found on the Internet a case that could help us understand more what this is, and I will attach a video at the end of this post that explains it with other words.
The case is the following: 
Feldman & Prohaska (1979) performed an experiment to study the effect of student expectations of teachers. One group was told their teacher was "quite effective," and another group was told their teacher was "incompetent." The effect of these positive and negative expectations were measured in terms of student attitudes toward the teacher, scores on tests, and "nonverbal behavior" of the students toward the teachers. The teacher was blind to what the students thought about him/her. There were clear differences in all three measures based on a positive or negative expectation. Students with a negative expectation "rated the lesson as being more difficult, less interesting, and less effective." Students with a positive expectation scored 65.8% on the test, and those with a negative expectation scored 52.2%. In terms on 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. Overall, the expecation of the teacher affects overall learning outcomes.
Pygmalion Effect Video
With this, I accomplish Task # 3.
References and Resources: Academic dictionaries and encyclopedias. 2009. The Pygmalion Effect. http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/296828. Accesed 12 August 2010. (Case also found here).
Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZZs5atIGDU&feature=related
Images taken from:
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSYhSfQZdTAQvU1iqYAmNjWuHbwczVzvyN4SHnbBuEdD8m6-4TcRPc29FJ85wiPTEOCmlGi4Js5k8RxwNFtRCLL4tVUedPZmlxJZ5jvpsJBxsUad4AmhnP2bbdMJWpA_hA6JcCVioKkaY/s400/mitos_griegos_pygmalion_2.jpg
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6OYkBC_TspOV3z4AhTKxisQkGrVp6OU4SulbqHDQY50k7OskS6kLeQNZeuXynEd3UTGem1u5aRwV4AuMBJ6d-Ao4vFWoJFjRpRbWEgn_U2i2xlDinLmiimcRBf45sFL94sMFbOqCVTsQ/s320/Galatea.jpg
http://www.calgarybeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/PYGMALION-FACTOR.jpg
Images taken from:
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSYhSfQZdTAQvU1iqYAmNjWuHbwczVzvyN4SHnbBuEdD8m6-4TcRPc29FJ85wiPTEOCmlGi4Js5k8RxwNFtRCLL4tVUedPZmlxJZ5jvpsJBxsUad4AmhnP2bbdMJWpA_hA6JcCVioKkaY/s400/mitos_griegos_pygmalion_2.jpg
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6OYkBC_TspOV3z4AhTKxisQkGrVp6OU4SulbqHDQY50k7OskS6kLeQNZeuXynEd3UTGem1u5aRwV4AuMBJ6d-Ao4vFWoJFjRpRbWEgn_U2i2xlDinLmiimcRBf45sFL94sMFbOqCVTsQ/s320/Galatea.jpg
http://www.calgarybeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/PYGMALION-FACTOR.jpg
Currently, we can see multiple changes at schools, companies or our own life when we use some tools that make people perform in a positive or negative way. Like your example said, the students with a high expectation have better grades, and this is because of the pygmalion effect that make a person act motivated by the other person thinking, the teacher in this case gets what he expects to have of his students, this phenomenon helps us to understand the behavior of actors involved in an situation.
ResponderEliminarI thought this was very interesting because me being a teacher myself,i never thought of relating astudents performance on their expectations of the teacher and this actually helped me to see the students who are maybe slacking or who are not doing well in a different way and make it a challange for me to try to change any negative expectations that may be in the air towards me in order to improve students performance.
ResponderEliminar