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Self-fulfilling prophecy
A self-fulfilling prophecy is the sociopsychological phenomenon of someone "predicting" or expecting something, and this "prediction" or expectation coming true simply because the person believes it will and the person's resulting behaviors aligning to fulfill the belief. This suggests that people's beliefs influence their actions. The principle behind this phenomenon is that people create consequences regarding people or events, based on previous knowledge of the subject. There are 3 factors within an environment that can come together to influence the likelihood of a self-fulfilling prophecy becoming a reality. These would be appearance, perception and belief. When a phenomena cannot be seen, appearance is what we rely upon when a self-fulfilling prophecy is in place. When it comes to a self-fulfilling prophecy there also must be a distinction “between “brute and institutional” facts” The philosopher John Searle states the difference as  ““facts [that] exist independently of any human institutions; institutional facts can only exist within institutions”” There is an inability of institutional facts to be self-fulfilling. For example, the old belief that the Earth is flat (institutional) when it is known to be spherical (brute) There has to be a consensus by “large numbers of people within a given population” asides from being institutional, social, or binded by the laws of nature for an idea to be seen as self-fulfilling. A self-fulfilling prophecy is applicable to either negative or positive outcomes. It can be concluded that establishing a label towards someone or something significantly impacts their perception and influences them to establish self-fulfilling prophecy.

A self-fulfilling prophecy has been considered an inherently false conception based on the way Merton defines self fulfilling, which makes it a restrictive theory due to the fact that it must be a false idea from the start in order for the resulting outcome to have proved the initial thought to be true.

The expectations of a relationship or the inferiority complex felt by young minority children are examples of the negative effects of real false beliefs being self-fulfilling.

American sociologist W. I. Thomas was the first to discover this phenomenon. In 1928 he developed the Thomas theorem (also known as the Thomas dictum), stating that,

If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.

In other words, the consequence will come to fruition based on how one interprets the situation. Because of the way the Thomas’ defined a self-fulfilling prophecy it can be regarded as relatively flexible and can apply to many things such as culture. On a societal level, there can be a consensus on what's deemed true depending on the importance of the part of the culture even if it's a false assumption and as a result of this perception of the culture it will become the outcome based on the behavior of the society. A person’s perception can be “self-creating” if the belief they have is acted upon by their behavior which aligns with the outcome.

Building on Thomas' idea, another American sociologist, Robert K. Merton, used the term "self-fulfilling prophecy" for it, popularizing the idea that “a belief or expectation, correct or incorrect, could bring about a desired or expected outcome.” While Robert K. Merton is typically credited for this theory since he coined the name, The Thomas’s developed it earlier on along with the philosophers Karl Popper and Alan Gerwith who also independently contributed to the idea behind this theory in their works which came before Merton as well. Self-fulfilling prophecies are an example of the more general phenomenon of positive feedback loops.

Self fulfilling prophecies have been seen throughout literature and have earlier origins from Krishna. A self-fullinging prophecy would also be complementary to a self-defeating prophecy. Self defeating prophecies are when an outcome occurs from a situation but the intention was to avoid the outcome. Based on the assumptions a person has, their belief will rule them to act towards the opposite outcome that would be positive, however their behavior causes an opposite.

International relations Applications:
Self-fulfilling prophecies have been apparent throughout history where different countries fall into the ‘Thucydides trap’. This term has been coined by Graham Allison and is defined by the occurrence of a rising power threatening a ruling or dominant power. Thuycidides was an Athenian historian and general who recorded the Pelpeonnesian war between Sparta and Athens. Thuycidides wrote, ““It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this instilled in Sparta that made war inevitable.” Of the 12 out of 16 wars that have occurred throughout history, each time the countries involved have succumbed to this tendency. The common theme of feeling threatened by another worldly power that may eventually surpass them puts the dominant power in a position to act on its fears which would equate to a potential war. A present day example of this sense of worry and anxiety is of China's rapid progression which threatens the U.S. as a dominant or ruling power. If the United States were to let the continuous growth of China lead into competition and the behavior of trying to restrict the growth of China it would push the two powers towards war which would be the result of the self-fulling prophecy. American political scientist Joseph Nye Jr. suggests to security analysts not to be too hasty as to allow their fear of impending conflict to become a reality and cause a self-fulfilling prophecy to occur. If countries make others out to be an enemy in their head, they secure the future of hostility. Another example of self-fulfilling prophecies is when the U.S. invaded Iraq back in 2002 based on the assumption it was a terrorist threat. However, according to evidence, it shows that no threat was posed by Iraq. The decisions made by the Bush administration stemmed from the desire to overthrow and dominate the regime which resulted in Iraq becoming a terrorist threat and a stronghold for the terrorist organization known as Al Qaeda., and henceforth confirming the initial belief of a potential threat. The belief that democratic peace is the best way to maintain a country is only deemed true among the masses falls into the category of being a self-fulfilling prophecy. If one country perceives another as peaceful and not restricting their ability to grow and function as they currently do, the belief will be held by both. This makes the definition when applied to countries as flexible for the possibility that it can also depend on the consensus of those who believe in a specific principle.

History:
Robert K. Merton is a sociologist who was also known as the “father of sociology”. He helped create many different theories such as aniome, social structure as well as the different modes of individual adaptation. Merton was deeply passionate and interested in the sociology of science, during his time at Columbia University he was able to research and discover many different concepts such as “social structure, bureaucracy, mass communication, and the sociology of science”. He established what his theory was and he would then start testing it right away without developing the concept. Merton would not worry about developing the theory because he was never looking for a “grand” theory, he was looking for a “practical” theory.

Merton applied this concept to a fictional situation called “The Last National Bank”. In his book Social Theory and Social Structure, he uses the example of a bank run to show how self-fulfilling thoughts can make unwanted situations happen. Rumors spread around the town about the Millingville bank and He mentions how a number of people falsely believe the bank was going to file for bankruptcy. Because of this false fear, many people decide to go to the bank and ask for all of their cash at once. The owner of the bank, Cartwright Millingville was once proud about the bank being alive and well which was thanks to the ubiquitous trust in the bank which gave it it’s stability but as the week fell upon what was called “Black Wednesday”, things took a turn when the depositors lost faith in the validity of the bank according to Merton. These actions caused the bank to indeed go bankrupt because banks rarely have the amount of cash on hand to satisfy a large number of customers asking for all of their deposited cash at once. The people with money in the bank were the ones to define their perception or truth of the bank’s ability to safely hold their money without risk. They were able to determine their new definition of the bank which became an overall consensus as many rushed to withdraw whatever was left after their scramble to ensure their money was secure in their own hands. Their loss of faith led to the banks eventual failure which wasn’t an initially true assumption until the depositors made it so.

Merton concludes this example with the analysis, “The prophecy of collapse led to its own fulfillment”.

While Merton's example focused on self-fulfilling prophecies within a business, his theory is also applicable to interpersonal communication since it is found to have a “potential for triggering self-fulfilling prophecy effects”. This is due to the fact “that an individual decides whether or not to conform to the expectations of others”. This makes people rely upon or fall into self-fulfilling thoughts since they are trying to satisfy other's perceptions of them. This theory was applied to experiments done by Dr. Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson in the Pygmalion in the Classroom Study who tested the IQ’s of 1st and 2nd grade elementary students. Where random students' IQ scores aligned with the expectation the teachers had been given about the students eventual success.

Self-fulfilling theory can be divided into two behaviors, one would be the Pygmalion effect which is when “one person has expectations of another, changes her behavior in accordance with these expectations, and the object of the expectations then also changes her behavior as a result”.

Applications:
There is extensive evidence[ where?] of "Interpersonal Expectation Effects", where the seemingly private expectations of individuals can predict the outcome of the world around them. The mechanisms by which this occurs are also reasonably well understood: it is simply that our own expectations change our behaviour in ways we may not notice and correct. In the case of the "Interpersonal Expectation Effects", others pick up on non-verbal behaviour, which affects their attitudes. An example includes the Pygmalion in the Classroom study where teachers were told arbitrarily that random students were likely to show significant intellectual growth As a result, those random students actually ended the year with significantly greater improvement when given another IQ test “The control group for all grade levels gained about eight points between the two tests, while the treatment group gained about twelve;” Although the exact actions behind what the teachers did to lead the study towards the initial expectation of student success is unknown, teachers who have higher expectations typically, give “more time to answer questions, more specific feedback, and more approval”.

Relationships
A leading study by Columbia University found that self-fulfilling prophecies have some part in relationships. The beliefs by people in relationships can impact the likelihood of a breakup or the overall health of the relationship. It was suggested by L. Alan Sroufe, that “rejection expectations can lead people to behave in ways that elicit rejection from others.” The study looked at the inner workings behind the role of self-fulfilling prophecies in romantic relationships of people who were deemed high in rejection sensitivity which was defined as “the disposition to anxiously expect, readily perceive, and overreact to rejection”. Couples were sampled from Columbia University and prompted to journal their thoughts and feelings in regards to their relationships. The psychologist professor Dr. Geraldine Downey found that women were more likely to experience rejection sensitivity in comparison to the negativity held by men about the future of their relationships. “RS was a stronger predictor of concern about rejection during conflict, and of feeling lonely and unloved after conflict, in women than in men” The original hypothesis aligned with the findings that “HRS women may be more likely to behave in ways that exacerbate conflicts.” The conclusion was that women with high rejection sensitivity were more likely to “behave in ways that erode their partners' relationship satisfaction and commitment.” The feelings of rejection would eventually cause the women to stop the relationship from the built up dissatisfaction.

Stereotype
African American psychologist Kenneth B. Clark studied the responses of Black children ages 3-7 years old to black and white dolls in the 1960s. From his reports on his research, the term "self-fulfilling prophecy" made it's first appearance in educational literature. The theory of self-fulfilling prophecy contributed to the impact of racism on the children. The responses from Clark's study ranged from some calling the black doll ugly and one girl bursting into tears when prompted to pick the doll she identified with. The black children internalized the inferiority they learned and acted as such as a result of their placement within society. Clark who aided in pushing the Supreme court decision towards the desegregation of schools in the case of the Brown v. The Board of Education, also noted the influence of teachers on the achievement levels between black and white students. ““the importance of the role of teachers in developing self-image, academic aspirations and achievements of their students”” prompted Clark to begin a study in 10 inner city schools where he assessed the attitudes and behaviors of teachers. The belief held by teachers was that minority students were dumb and therefore they didn’t put effort into them. The low expectations of the teachers aligned with their initial belief which was low IQ test scores.

Clark wrote, ““If a child scores low on an intelligence test because he cannot read and then is not taught to read because he has a low score, then such a child is being imprisoned in an iron circle and becomes the victim of an educational self-fulfilling prophecy””

Kenneth B. Clarks ideas about educational Self-fulfilling prophecies opened up minds to the effectiveness of teaching and the expectations teachers place upon students.