Self-fulfilling prophecy

A self-fulfilling prophecy is an expectation that helps bring about the outcome it predicts, often by changing how people act toward one another.

Feedback loop: A process in which an outcome feeds back into the conditions that produced it. The expectation changes behavior, and the resulting outcome can reinforce the expectation.
W. I. Thomas: An American sociologist whose work helped establish the importance of people's interpretations of situations. His formulation that situations defined as real become real in their consequences anticipated the concept.
Bank run: A rapid withdrawal of deposits by customers who fear a bank cannot meet its obligations. Merton used a fictional bank run to show how fear of insolvency could help cause insolvency.
Self-defeating prophecy: A prediction that prompts actions that prevent the predicted outcome from occurring. It reverses the outcome pattern: the prediction helps make itself false.
Confirmation bias: The tendency to favor information that supports existing beliefs and discount information that challenges them. Once an expectation seems confirmed, people may notice supporting outcomes and overlook disconfirming ones.
Thomas theorem: The sociological proposition that situations people define as real become real in their consequences. It provides an early account of how shared interpretations can produce real outcomes.
Pygmalion effect: Improved performance associated with high expectations from an authority figure or other influential person. It names a proposed positive expectancy effect, especially in educational settings.
Forecasting: The practice of estimating future events using evidence, models, or expert judgment. A forecast need not influence the event it predicts, unlike a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Behavioral confirmation: A process in which one person's expectation elicits behavior from another that appears to confirm it. It describes the interpersonal route by which expectations can produce confirming responses.
Robert K. Merton: An American sociologist known for influential work on social theory, institutions, and the sociology of science. He named and analyzed the self-fulfilling prophecy in a 1948 essay.

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