INDUSTRIALIZATION AS A SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY: THE ROLE OF EXPECTATIONS IN DEVELOPMENT

A self-fulfilling prophecy (SFP) occurs when the expectation of an event induces the behavior that increases the likelihood of the event's occurrence. Work organizations can be more or less effective as a result of SFP effects, whether naturally-occurring or deliberately induced by managers or consultants. Evidence for SFP at the individual level and at the collective level in work organizations is reviewed, including the Pygmalion, Galatea, Golem, and Messiah effects. Next, the SFP concept is extended beyond the single organization to the industrialization process at the national level. This leads to the novel hypothesis that, to the extent that persons in a developing nation expect industrialization to progress rapidly and successfully, the development process is facilitated. Several examples of SFP on Israel's path to industrialization are described, and emulation of these examples by other newly industrialized countries is proposed.     

The contributionof task-related factors to ERP repetition effects at short and long lags

Event-related potentials (ERPs) were used to assess the relative contribution of task-related decision-making processes to the repetition effect at Lags 0 and 15. Electrophysiological activity was recorded from 16 subjects in two tasks. Task A required a lexical decision: subjects were instructed to silently count infrequently occurring nonwords in a list of words and nonwords. Task B, a recognition memory task presented in four blocks, required subjects to distinguish between old and new probes in each block. Significant ERP repetition effects, equivalent in both tasks, were found at Lag 0. In contrast, at Lag 15, the repetition effect was significant only in Task A. These results suggest that ERPs are sensitive primarily to poststimulus-identification sources of the repetition effect, such as the recovery of episodic traces related to stimulus-categorization and decision-making processes.     

Interpersonal loss and self-mutilation

Self-mutilation was hypothesized to increase in frequency during periods of interpersonal loss in a treatment program for seriously disturbed adolescents. The study examined changes in the frequency of acts of self-mutilation, aggression, and running away for 32 teenagers who experienced interpersonal loss when staff members left employment. Data were collected for a 4-year period. Statistical findings indicated that the frequency of self-mutilation increased significantly during the time period of anticipated loss, 2 weeks prior to staff terminations. There was no significant increase in the frequency of self-mutilation immediately following the staff terminations. Also, there was no significant change in the rates of aggression or running away either before or after the loss events. It was concluded that the time of anticipated loss was the period of highest risk for these adolescents in terms of self-mutilative behavior.     

Personality, Mythology and Religion

This paper contrasts Judaism and Hellenism with regard to two opposing personality types: the “participant” and the “separant.” “Participant” means the identification of the ego with people, objects or symbols outside the self, and the desire to have one's separate identity in fusion with these externals. “Separation” implies the opposite. Hellinism is identified with the separate Sisyphean culture, and Judaism with the participant Tantalic culture.     

Burnout in Spurned Medical Caregivers and the Impact of Job Expectancy Training

This study represents an extrapolation to the practical realm of a theoretical model that has been supported thus far only by laboratory studies. The model regards the rejection of help by people in need as being stressful for caregivers partly because it violates their expectations of acceptance and threatens their self-image as competent caregivers. It was hypothesized that high levels of perceived rejection by patients and others at work would contribute to burnout in medical caregivers. It was also predicted that high levels of stress preparation in caregivers' training with regard to job expectancies and patient (non)compliance would lessen burnout and buffer the effects of spurning. Responses to a questionnaire by a sample of physicians and hospital nurses revealed a direct association of perceived spurning, as well as an inverse association of stress preparation with burnout, and gave some indication of buffering, as hypothesized. Expressions of violated expectancies and of job disillusionment were directly associated with burnout and inversely associated with stress preparation. Informal job expectancy shaped by coworkers was found to be directly associated with burnout in physicians, but it was inversely associated with burn out in nurses. The implications of these findings are considered     

An External Validation of Laboratory Evidence for Earned Dignity

Both theoretical arguments and laboratory evidence indicate that society awards earned dignity (worth) to persons perceived as voluntarily performing praiseworthy behaviors. Laboratory research, as well as common observation, indicates also that society accords an intrinsic dignity unconditionally to all people. On a questionnaire given in class, college students reported increased dignity earned by the Russians from their praiseworthy (i.e., embracing freedom) and voluntary rejection of the attempted coup in 1991. The questionnaire also revealed a general belief in intrinsic dignity. External evidence for earned dignity is shown by increased international support for the Russians after rejection of the coup. This convergence of laboratory and external data validates the laboratory techniques for studying social perception of human dignity.     

Perceived sex differences in managerially relevant characteristics

A national sample of 884 male managers completed a survey of managerially relevant perceived sex differences. Females were rated lower on the following scales: (a) aptitudes, skills, and knowledge; (b) motivation and job interest; (c) temperament; and (d) work habits and attitudes. Moreover, lower ratings of women were prevalent among males in a variety of jobs, organizations, and industries.     

Dichotic sequence discrimination: The effect of continued practice

Summary Dichotic sequence discrimination was studied by means of a three-alternative forced-choice method. Two of the alternatives (same) consisted of a single pair of dichotic clicks with the stimulus at one ear preceding the stimulus at the other ear by a given temporal separation (e.g., R-t-L). One of the alternatives consisted of a single pair of clicks with the opposite sequence (e.g., L-t-R). The subjects' task was to discriminate between the different and the same dichotic pairs. The results indicate that discrimination is a nonmonotonic function of t, i.e., V- or U-shaped, with high levels at both short and long temporal separations (t=2 and 4 ms and t=64 and 96 ms) and with lower levels of discrimination for intermediate ts. A second experiment was performed to study the effect of continued practice by subjects trained in dichotic sequence discrimination for ts 4 and 64 ms (high discrimination levels) and for t=16 ms (low discrimination level). There was no systematic trend towards improvement over 8 blocks of 50 trials for each t. Discrimination levels of these ts did not differ between Experiments 1 and 2.Dr. Babkoff is spending the 1979–1981 academic year at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Department of Military Medical Psychophysiology, Forest Glen Annex, Building 189, Washington, D.C. 20012, USAThe experiments were conducted at the Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel. The authors would like to thank the Bar-Ilan Research Committee for making funds available to conduct the experimentsThis material has been reviewed by the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, and there is no objection to its presentation and/or publication. The opinions or assertions contained herein are the private views of the authors and are not to be construed as official or as reflecting the views of the Department of the Army or the Department of Defense     

Tests of a two-stage model of visual matching

Predictions from a model of visual matching were tested in two experiments. The model consists of a wholistic comparison process followed by an element-by-element comparison process. All stimuli are processed by the first stage but only those that permit a decision based on a wholistic comparison produce responses. When discrimination is difficult and a decision cannot be reached by a wholistic comparison, the second stage of processing is initiated. Degree of discriminability and stimulus duration (100 and 1000 msec.) were varied in both experiments. In Exp. 1, the stimulus elements were arranged in a square configuration to facilitate a wholistic comparison. As predicted, the hard-different stimuli took longer to match than the same or easy-different stimuli. The hard-different stimuli presented for 1000 msec. took longer to match than those presented for 100 msec. There was no difference in accuracy between responses to hard-different pairs at the two durations. In Exp. 2, the stimulus elements were arranged in a horizontal row and placed one above the other to facilitate element-by-element comparison. As predicted, these stimuli produced slower and more accurate responses for same and hard-different stimulus pairs only when they were exposed for 1000 msec. Responses to easy-different stimulus pairs were made quickly and accurately.