Have you ever checked your weekly fortune on an astrology website and start your Monday with such confidence that everything just works out smoothly as expected? Have your fortune cookies ever given you any fine words and luck? How about a medium or psychic? How about the act of praying to God himself? The list can go on and on.
On the contrary of luck, ladies, have you ever lowered your expectations to “all guys are assholes” so that you won’t be too attached when things don’t work out, and later on you find out the one you are dating is an asshole? Gentlemen, how about you? Any thought about your ladies that hurtfully turns out to be true? I imagine most of us would say, “Been there, done that.”
I’m sure most of you heard of the theory about positivity magnet, which means positive attitudes attract good luck and negative emotions attract bad luck. Many of you have experienced both sides of the magnet and try to stay positive in life as much as possible. Some of you might even go further and ask for good vibes from the spiritual world. They all work, trust me, which I will explain next.
In communication theory, there’s a behavior in the exploration of communication and the self that can eventually change the resistant self-concept, called the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy.
“Self-Fulfilling Prophecy happens when someone’s expectation of an event, and his or her subsequent behavior based on those expectations, make the event more likely to occur than would otherwise have been true.” (p. 49 of Looking Out, Looking In, 2014)
It’s the way we set an expectation in our mind and unconsciously behave in a certain way to make sure our expectation will occur. Self-Fulfilling Prophecies not only work on ourselves, they also affect the people around us. For example, discrimination. A full cycle of Self-Fulfilling Prophecy involves 4 stages, and I will give you an example for each stage:
1) Holding an expectation, which means you have a self-created opinion about a person or an event without any further research.
Example: An awkward-looking guy who is not very articulate on introducing himself joins in my group. Instantly I thought to myself, “He ain’t gonna be much of help.”
2) Behaving in accordance with that expectation, which means you unconsciously behave in a way to make sure the expectation is achieved.
Example: I thought he wouldn’t be very helpful, so I don’t talk to him or ask for his opinions on the project, even though he sits right next to me and leans in trying to be involved.
3) The expectation coming to pass, which means the expected person or event starts to progress or behave in the way that you first expected.
Example: Since I don’t talk to him, and in this case let’s assume everyone else in the group does the same, he becomes shyer and afraid to speak out loud. Or even more extreme, he barely comes to class now.
4) Reinforcing the original expectation, which means you see the expected result as the prophecy has been fulfilled.
Example: This guy doesn’t talk much in our group and now he stops coming to class, so I thought to myself, “See? I knew he ain’t good”.
In reality, he might be the smartest guy in the class, but I will never know that. And throughout the entire cycle, I wouldn’t even notice that his behavior is a reflection of my own actions.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy could be very helpful but also dangerous at the same time. It’s also found everywhere, workplace, school, media, relationships, etc. and even racial issues. How do you think racism or segregation operates? When you expect positive things and work toward that goal, good things will happen to you. If you are a kind and open-minded person, you unconsciously invite others to stay with you comfortably. Although I suspect it works differently in relationships because it requires more than one person’s effort, but the concept is the same. However, when you set a negative impression first, then you probably won’t get a positive result. -1 + (-1) = -2, it won’t give you a positive outcome. Period.
Therefore, be aware of your own thoughts and watch out for Self-Fulfilling Prophecies. If you are mostly an optimistic person, keep the good times rolling! If you have negative thoughts often, then I hope this article helps you and encourages you to be more positive. If you feel like someone is projecting a negative Self-Fulfilling Prophecy on you, don’t be afraid to talk to them and confront the issue, it’s better than doubting yourself. If they are just stubborn, well, you can always drag them out of the comfort zone if you’d bother to.
