What's the Pygmalion Effect? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[Music]. welcome to stuff you should know a. production of iHeart. Radio hey and welcome to the podcast I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's. lingering too she's a lurker and this is. stuff you should. know the education Edition yeah I'm. pretty excited about this after learning. more about it yeah this is your pick. where'd you come up with this I don't. know oh that's good I was I was hoping.

that it wasn't like well I had a really. bad experience with a teacher when I was. a kid no I had always good experiences. generally but now I'm worried that it. was a uh a listener because I've gotten. a few of those lately like hey when you. said you didn't know it was me oh no I. usually make a note but uh sure sure I. don't know well if you suggested the. pigmon effect you probably the only one. and you can feel free to email and be. like hey sorry and you said you didn't. know it was me me yeah well we're.

talking about the pigan effect and it. does have to do with education but it. has to do with you know more than that. too um and for those of you who don't. know the pigmon effect is a kind of. self-fulfilling prophecy it's called an. expectancy bias I believe and it. basically says in effect that if you um. have high expectations for say a student. or an employee or something they're. likely to perform better than other. people and it has something to do in all.

sorts of different ways it turns out. from that that relationship that high. expectation and it's pretty neat if you. think about it um and pigmon it's named. after um I guess a Ovid metamorphosis um. story right yeah I think it was um I. believe it was a a statue isn't that. right I think pigmon was the sculptor. and the statue is. Gala okay I knew it from um you know cuz.

I'm not the art. major well I'm not either I was the. English major so I read George Bernard. Charles play pigmon in college in a. class uh and then of course the the my. fair lady was based on pigmon in which. uh I think her name was Liza dittle sort. of hey let's take this Rough Around the. Edges uh young woman and and make her. into a fair lady I knew it as Trading. Places exactly but that you know sort of.

a classic story uh the original play is. great and it all has to do like you said. with this uh sort of self this idea of. the self-fulfilling prophecy which had. been around for a long long time but in. the 1960s of course when uh psychology. and doing studies on all kinds of things. was really blossoming and just sort of. exploding in all directions super hip. there was well I don't know about that. but maybe in in those communities right. but uh there was a psych olist named.

Robert Rosenthal who got pretty. interested in this idea of how bias can. affect something like performance or. assumptions or you know thinking like uh. you know it moved out of the classroom. but initially like hey this kid has. promise or this kid does it and then. they end up being like that yeah yeah. for sure and there's a lot of. implications obviously of you know okay. well then does that mean that there's. kids who are not performing as well as. they could be because they're not being.

treated well by their teachers like sure. there's a lot and I think one of the. things that I like about this is that it. just how much debate and research and. argument has gone into just this one. segment of approaching education really. just goes to show how seriously we take. education or have at least in the past. yeah I I think so I mean that certainly. doesn't mean we figured it out but no I. think people have long studied and tried. and argued and debated on the best way.

to make help kids reach their potential. and that's a good thing yeah so there. was a sociologist named Robert Merton. and he turns out to have been the person. who coined the term self-fulfilling. prophecy I hope he um copyrighted it. because I owe him some money just. me anyway that was back in 1948 and even. by then that was a good almost 50 years. after um experimental data started. coming in that showed self-fulfilling. prophecy existed so our I guess our kind.

of hero or at least protagonist. antagonist I guess it depends on how you. look at him Robert Rosenthal um in the. 60s He Hit Upon a pretty great um study. idea along with a a colleague of his. named Kermit fod which is a great name. yeah in writing out loud blinked out in. Morse code it's a great name all across. the board but working together back in. 1963 they took on running rats through. mazes which was already like just so.

cliched back then that it was like a. perfect thing to experiment on because. it was like the the people that they. were actually experimenting on the. students who were running the research. were the ones who were being. experimented on but the rats and mazes. was just so ubiquitous they didn't. question that at all it didn't even. occur to them that they would be being. experimented on yeah and they ended up. coming up what I think should be just. these words on a T-shirt and just don't. even explain it because what they told.

experimenters that were working with. these rats they said all right you got. some really uh great rats in this group. MH and they were bred to be maze bright. but those other ones they're maze dull. right and I just think that would be fun. on a t-shirt but um actually these rats. were assigned randomly uh but what they. found out was that the dull Rats the. maze dull ones hit their Peak. Performance MH uh 3 days in and then. started to go downhill where these.

really uh bred to be maze bright rats. just kept on improving and so the. conclusion was I think these students. are getting these rats that are maze. bright and are just you know hey little. buddy you can do it I know you got it in. you sure you're a smart rat like they're. handling them better they're talking. them up they're encouraging them and. it's working yeah because I mean again. you said that they were assigned. randomly and there was no such thing as. maze Brite or maze doets they were all. just the same so they had to have. something to do with the researchers.

because there there was no difference. between any of the rats that were. assigned um I think in the worst the. worst interpretation is you could also. suggest that the um mazee bright rat. student experimenters could could even. have been fudging the numbers a little. bit to meet their expectations. unconsciously or not but it's. possibility and actually that kind of. led to one kind of branch of study that. that.

that came out of that maze bright maze. dull red experiment um how much. expectancy bias affects researchers in. scientific studies that was the first. leap that it went to um but shortly. after that it ended up in the classroom. because um a a principal of Spruce. School in Elementary in San Francisco. read about this rad experiment I think. it was an American scientist in 1963 is. and the principal Lenor Jacobson wrote.

to Robert Rosenthal and said hey um if. you ever want to replace like rats and. experimenters with students and teachers. I'm your person and very quickly. Rosenthal took Lenor Jacobson up on that. yeah by very quickly I guess in science. terms a couple of years later right and. they said all right uh you know we don't. know it now but this is going to end up. being a very very famous experiment. called The pigmon Experiment uh and. again you know named for the the art and.

the play and uh what else was it uh. Trading Places Trading Places that's. right I keep going to say 48 hours but. that's not it at all yeah but actually. tra that came afterward so you know what. I mean sure uh great movie though which. one Trading Places I love it okay i'. I've never seen 48 hours oh really yeah. it's a good one okay so which one's. better Trading Places or 48 Hours well I. mean they're both kind of great one is.

just more of a straightup comedy which. is Trading Places sure uh 48 Hours was. sort of in that cop buddy movie uhhuh uh. action thing also has laughs yeah for. sure but you know it's Prime Eddie. Murphy okay that sound like more of a. Trading Spaces person to me Trading. Places Trading Places that's a HDTV show. yeah it totally is so uh boy that was a. good Sidetrack Eddie Murphy's got a new. Beverly Hills Cop coming out by the way. oh yeah that's right right I wonder how.

that's going to be I wonder too I don't. feel like he's aging poorly he doesn't. seem to be getting less funny over time. although I haven't seen any of his stuff. very. recently we'll see I haven't either okay. I'm reserving my opinion to all right. that's fair all right so Spruce School. San Francisco uh it was performed on. these kids uh a white majority. Mexican-American minority but mostly. working class kids this wasn't some like. when I first heard Spruce School I. thought it was some like super hoyy toy. private school I did too it sounds like.

it it sure does doesn't it especially in. San Francisco but one more thing very. crucially about this school the kids. were grouped by reading ability so if. you weren't a very good reader you were. in a group or a class with other kids. who weren't a very good reader and so on. and so forth yeah and we're going to. talk a lot about grouping because it has. a lot to it's not a great thing to do as. it turns out and it's got a lot to do. with a lot of this for sure so students. uh at the school they were given a test. and the researchers told these teachers. and as we'll crucially find out too this.

test was not given by the researchers. they were given by the teachers correct. yes uh so that's going to come into play. as well but they told the teachers said. all right we've got these results you've. got some uh Bloomers or quote unquote. growth spurs in your class and they're. probably just like these uh maze bright. rats they're like the they're going to. really improve over the school year just. you watch uh we gave him this test it. was the Harvard's test of. inflected acquisition uh and it's.

supposed to assess their potential which. was not true at all what they actually. took was an IQ test called uh toga. Flanigan's test of General ability and. there were some problems with that right. off the bat right with this toga test so. one thing Chuck about that test of. inflected acquisition it didn't exist. they just they made it up so that. teachers if they were possibly familiar. with the test of General ability um they. wouldn't be like wait this isn't this.

isn't what you would use to find gross. burs or Bloomers they just made up a. test because this was a madeup um the. results were supposed to be made up too. again the the teachers thought that they. were administering a test and that the. results were real world but they were. being lied to they were being. manipulated in the exact same way those. students were told that some of their. rats were maze bright or maze dull exact. same experiment just with humans now. yeah because the idea is to see if. teachers think that a kid is supposed to.

have a growth spurt uh intellectually. then that will end up being the. self-fulfilling prophecy so these. students were uh chosen at random uh the. teachers were given that information and. after months and months they took this. test again the toga test at the. eight-month Mark uh the one-year Mark. and the two-year Mark yeah and so just. as Rosenthal predicted in his hypothesis. I should say Rosenthal and Jacobson um. the principal the the people who had.

been or the kids who had been identified. as growth Spurs or Bloomers actually did. Bloom academically they they gained um. all sorts of IQ points over the course. of the eight months and then year and. then two years when they took and retook. the test um and that even though the. effects were mostly pronounced among. first and second graders um that was. enough that was enough to just kind of. show like this is a real deal these kids. were no different than the other kids. the only was that these Bloomers were.

the ones who were whose teachers were. told keep an eye on them because they're. going to be amazing kids yeah and what's. interesting is for the uh I think the. third fifth and sixth graders they. showed that they actually improved at. the same rate the Bloomers did the ones. who were assigned that tag at least uh. at the same rate or slightly even slower. rate or lower rate the control group and. the researchers Rosenthal basically said. well that's because when you're younger. your your mind is more malleable um and.

so that that's probably it and also um. because the school and these teachers. probably um you know think that their. reputation wasn't uh like they they may. have felt bad for these kids who weren't. who didn't get the Bloomer tag so they. may have um like paid more attention to. them or something right or the younger. kids hadn't been at school long enough. to establish like hey I'm actually not. that smart or hey I'm actually really. bright so they their their reputation.

wasn't established you know no Big Man. on Campus label had been applied yet. yeah so if you're starting to sense like. oh wait a minute then he just. immediately sort of explained away. something that didn't agree with his. finding you will see that that uh kind. of becomes part of the story right so. they published a study in 1968 called. pigmon in the classroom and again they. named it after um pigmon because in that. story from oid the the the sculptor. pigmon um sculpts a a beautiful woman.

falls in love with her and um loves the. statue so much that the goddess Venus. says I'm going to make you a real life. person so the attention that that um. pigmon paid to galatea his statue. created a magical transformation in his. statue from statue to human there was. some sort of magical intervention so it. actually is a really great great name. and I I can't think that that didn't. have something to do with how much it.

exploded onto the scene because it's. really difficult to understate what just. a bomb this dropped not just in Academia. but in popular culture it got picked up. and talked about for years. afterward that sounds like a great place. to break eh I thought you might say that. all right well let's take a break and. we'll be right back and talk about this. explosion of understanding right after. [Music]. this.

[Music]. learning Stu is fun with Josh and. Sh St you. [Music]. sh all right so where we left off uh the. study was called pigmon in the classroom. publ uh published in 68 as the paper and. then also notably as a full book. uh if it was just the paper it may have.

just sort of been you know passed around. through Academia but because it was a. book it became very popular and all of a. sudden Barbara Walters is interviewing. Rosenthal and the New York Times is got. it on the front page and you know like. the mainstream media is all over this is. you know basically saying and you know. kind of like the media does with. something like this they're not digging. into the data like uh Academia will as. we'll see right but they'll run big. headlines and they'll say this is really.

significant because we all knew that uh. the way we teach our kids is wrong and. this kind of proves it yeah so I think. that was another reason why it it had. such a huge effect on like the larger. culture because people had been. suspecting for a while that putting um. kids into groups by you know reading. ability was a bad idea it was doing a. disservice to him now there's this paper. that. showed demonstrably that that was. absolutely true was a terrible idea and.

yeah like you said there were headlines. all over the place people were. discussing it and um. Rosenthal he he was basically the the. ring leader the the ring Master to all. this stuff he was very much on board. with not pointing out oh actually you. guys are missing a lot of nuance it's. not quite that cut and dry he was like. yep absolutely like exactly what you're. saying this black and white thing where. like yes this is absolute proof I'm. totally going to go along with that and. he got criticized just for that alone um.

just not not not intervening in how his. science and findings was being. communicated to the larger public and in. fact kind of playing a role in in making. that happen um just kind of capitalizing. on the general population's. incomprehension of statistical analysis. we don't we don't know what that is or. how to do it so we rely on scientists to. explain it to us in terms we can stand. or the press and um if the scientists as.

we've covered many times Chuck isn't. forthright or honest that stuff can get. turned into all sorts of. misunderstandings or overblown findings. yeah and one of the big things too that. we should point out was that uh fact. that we told you earlier that um before. the break that these tests really kind. of showed this effect uh for these. younger kids in first and second grade. but but not for the you know the kids in.

the older grades and in fact it showed a. negative correlation sometimes in some. of the older grades they didn't even put. that in the book at all so they're. already sort of cherry-picking stuff and. the book was the thing that really blew. up uh more so than the paper and so of. course the Press uh isn't covering that. aspect of it probably because they. didn't even know about it yeah so. there's two tracks the popular press. like the New York Times or Today Show or. whatever they're covering it in glowing. terms like it's absolute proof of what. everybody always suspected um um the. other track uh was a a pretty wide river.

of criticism coming out of the halls of. Academia from other psychologists of. different Stripes um who just were. teeing off on this paper and even though. it didn't necessarily capture the. attention of the larger public um in. Academia there was a thorough debate. that that started right after the paper. came out and went on for a good decade. and actually turned out to be really. healthy um not just for rosenthal's. paper Rosenthal and Jacobson's paper but.

for um you I guess statistical analysis. as a whole but um I think because. Rosenthal ended up inadvertently. creating the metaanalysis study um but. before we get to that choke let's talk. about some of the stuff that was wrong. with the paper statistically speaking so. yeah I mean the toga test we should talk. about right out of the gate because this. test uh was not supposed to be used on. uh first graders or with kids with an IQ.

below 60 and that alone probably. accounts for or at least accounts for. some of the fact that these low results. were coming in on these kids in the. younger grades and then they would. obviously gain much more ground because. they've then aged into the test by their. time they're taking this when they're. really supposed to be exactly and there. was something that um that was Rosenthal. like responded to that and even said hey. even if that test doesn't apply uh to.

these younger kids the fact that the. same kid is taking the same test over. time um it really it renders that mood. it's still going to show accurate. results I see what he's saying there but. it's just moot to me because it wasn't. even supposed to be given to a kid that. young right but also he's totally full. of beans right there um he's so the. first initial findings that first test. produced such totally skewed results.

that as those kids aged into the test. and started getting normal results and. you compared those those later results. to the first results you would see all. sorts of crazy gains that were. completely incorrect like they just. weren't true that was a big part of it. that togga test was not set up for kids. with IQs under 60 which is a big problem. because first graders in the United. States on average had IQs of 58 and so. you can see it reflected in some of. those results like some kid had an IQ of.

18 that's almost impossible um and. certainly they wouldn't be like reading. at that point same with a kid I think. with 30 and then one of those kids later. went from like 30 to like a 100 which is. coming close to to maybe even gifted. level like the results were just. terrible and even worse than that in the. book as an academic should they didn't. include any of the raw data either yeah. so that means you know you can't go out.

as another researcher and sort of try. and replicate that mhm uh it just kind. of occurred to me what he was sort of. saying with that initial defense was. like uh you know you have a broken scale. that doesn't say what your true weight. is but you can still you know it's still. accurate because you can see how much. weight you gain or lose by using that. same scale right and you're like yeah. but you still don't know how much. somebody weighs yes that's true but then. also the thing that makes him dishonest. in that respon response is that imagine. it's broken the first time you weigh.

yourself and then you fix it and you you. weigh yourself after that and so those. are the right results but you're. comparing them to that first broken. result it's completely useless why does. anyone even have scales anyway I don't. know doesn't make any sense and why why. for God's sakes do they keep them at. hotels like at the beach oh I don't know. man there was one in one of my rooms. when we were on tour and this one was in. San Francisco I'm like thr it out the. window I just glared at it a couple of.

times and it eased itself back under the. vanity oh I mean hey I weigh myself to. keep track of things but for God's sakes. don't weigh yourself on vacation no I. was going to say I do at home but not. sure not on vacation not even on tour uh. so anyway scaled diversion aside like he. said he didn't include raw data that. means you can't come along afterward and. try and replicate it so that's a big. problem yeah uh other people uh chimed. in and said uh things like I think. Richard E snow was a psychologist who.

said also you know apparently teachers. couldn't remember and a lot of them. reported that they even didn't really. even glance at this list on who was a. bloomer or not a bloomer so it which is. very strange it sounds like some of. these teachers didn't even fully realize. or care much that they had an experiment. going on yeah I thought that was kind of. weird too um cuz I didn't get the. impression that these were anything but. you know normal dedicated teachers but I. don't know maybe they suspected that.

this was made up or that this was maybe. they they were like there's no test that. can really pick that up so I'm not even. going to pay attention of that kind of. thing or they were busy teaching that. that could be it too for sure um another. one was that the teachers themselves. administered the tests the initial tests. um so they they weren't administered by. professional child psychologist they. were administered by teachers who. already had an impression of the kids. they were administering the tests to. because it was the previous year's. teachers so if you were say in second.

grade your first grade teacher was the. one who administered your test I didn't. get that but that was another criticism. from Academia yeah absolutely um so. people are debating this uh they're. starting to sort of argue positions you. know for and against over time uh there. was a 2018 overview of a lot of these. debates uh from someone named Thomas El. good and Natasha sterzinger and Allison. Lavine and hats off Olivia for like. getting all these names mhm CU there's a.

lot of people that did a lot of. follow-up stuff so nice job yeah uh but. um they noted that the individual the. individual students result uh results. varied a lot um on the different post. tests saying you know basically we just. don't have a lot of evidence that these. IQs really improved at all yes but. here's the thing this is what's. astounding of it I think it was Robert. snow and his book review of it wrote.

that it's possible that the pigmon in. the in the classroom like study yeah. actually did turn up evidence of you. know this this idea that we've all. considered you know for a long time as. possible that teachers expectations. affect student performance right but if. if it did it did it by accident because. he was just saying like the study was so. poorly executed um and it seems like. Robert snow was correct in that that um. guess that somehow someway this study.

did show this is a real thing and over. time from this 10y year long debate over. the results and the methodology and all. that stuff and hats off to Rosenthal he. didn't just like he didn't just like. throw the study out and run off with a. big bag of money with a dollar sign on. it um he stood there and he he answered. his critics he had he engaged in the. debate for a good decade and over the. course of that decade more studies with. better methodology uh and better. execution were um were created and and.

studied the same effect this pigmon. effect and they found NOP he was right. whether it was a bad study or not this. is it produced some sort of correct. results that that we do realize now the. pigmon effect does have it it is real to. some degree yeah and depending on who. you were you could come at it from a. different angle and each of you have a. point uh because Olivia points out like. just sort of politically as far as um.

being hard on teachers or not it would. play out in different ways uh writer for. the San Francisco Chronicle said like oh. see here you go uh these low. expectations on these uh these children. of of lesser income that's what's. causing them to fall behind and maybe. even drop out of school later on whereas. the uh Albert Shanker who was with the. United Federation of teachers said no. this it's not the teacher's fault it's. you know it's poverty itself and we have.

too many kids in these classes and we. don't have the right materials MH yeah. and um regardless of where you fall on. it there was still a big push to do away. with like advanced placement classes or. gifted tracks or even remedial stuff. they were like just because you think a. kid's remedial do not put them in a. remedial class put them in like a mixed. aptitude class and they'll do way better. than if you put them in a remedial class. um that was a big deal. I I don't I guess it wasn't successful.

cuz there was still plenty of AP classes. and snotty little AP students in the 90s. when I was in high school just loveed to. shove it in your face oh I'm in AP. History did you not take any AP classes. no I I took a couple I took AP History. in English but um looking back like I. don't know I I can definitely see like. they were great classes and I felt like. the teachers were better but it Also may. have been my own bias because it was AP.

and also like a student that you. know they don't think should have tested. into there if they had been thrown in. there maybe they would have risen to. that level so it's you know with with. adult eyes I I look back at kind of how. messed up all that stuff was well if it. was better teaching from better teachers. with better material then the argument. for people who were like against that. would say all then all classes should be. like that every history class should be.

taught like that don't just make it for. the ones who you think are gifted or. whatever so um that was a that I think. that still probably is a big deal I'm. not particularly up on um the state of. education today or early childhood. education yeah so I don't know if. they're still putting kids in classes. different separate classes or not um but. if not I'm sure there's still people. arguing against it yeah I mean I'm not. sure yet as far as upper grades you know. all my experience right now is with Ruby. in the third grade at her little hippie.

dippy private school where of course. everybody is uh you know treated equally. and given the same opportunities. everyone wins or loses uh so one kind of. cool thing that came out of this was uh. because there was there were it was so. famous and because there were so many. people sort of criticizing it so many. people defending it and so many people. doing other studies CU as we'll see this. soon leapt into uh the private sector. with like business and the military uh.

like people started sort of applying. this kind of thing to all kinds of uh. you know stuff outside the classroom. yeah um it led to Rosenthal saying well. hey now I can look at like all these. studies together and like was that the. the literal birth of meta analysis was. he one of the first that's how I took it. yeah that 1978 he got together with a. colleague Donald Rubin who was the head. of Harvard's statistics or Stat. statistical analysis Department uhuh so.

this guy's like as good as it gets with. Statistics um and they got together 345. studies that looked at expectancy. effects and um found that there was like. there was a a pronounced effect that was. detected in the if you just looked at. the the high quality studies on it right. okay so they're looking at this stuff uh. like you pointed out earlier the people. couldn't replic because there wasn't raw. data and there were psychologists and.

Neuroscience researchers that were. pointing this stuff out like hey we. can't even replicate this thing MH uh. there were also people pointing out that. um the the people that are criticizing. it and the people that are defending it. like sometimes they're not even looking. at the same data right yeah so Rosenthal. was like Hey this if we're looking at. actual student progress based on teacher. expectations and you're just looking at. gains and IQ testing yeah um that's not. looking at the whole picture like if you. also take into um into account scores.

from year end achievement tests um or. teacher assessments on on uh Improvement. um or how many books a kid can walk. around with on their head without. spilling them over because they have. really good posture if you take all this. stuff into account you get a much. clearer picture of whether the student. actually did improve or not thanks to. teacher expectation yeah exactly so uh. and you know I mentioned they did it. outside the classroom I think they found.

the biggest gains in military settings. yeah which makes sense yeah the idea. that you know you probably just have. more sway as a drill sergeant than you. do as a teacher maybe yeah for sure you. have that much more influence and the. more influence and control you have over. somebody um the more effect your. expectations can have on them yeah but. they definitely like they saw this play. out so it's not like we're this is an. episode on how this isn't a thing. because it is a thing whether they found. it by accident or not like there was one.

example that Livia found where uh there. were employees putting together medical. kits and they brought in this group of. new hires and told the managers like hey. these people they're they're maze uh. Happy what was it maze maze um bright. yeah they're maze bright like you ought. to see them put together these kits like. you're going to do great they they got a. lot of potential here and that that. group ended up breaking records for. production levels right and so if you're. into man management science you're.

teaching everybody this like just just. go out and lie to your managers and the. the your employees will start like. actually producing way better than than. you would think for for no reason other. than their manager has higher. expectations thinks they're better at at. their job than other people and that is. a huge huge part of all of this yeah. there doesn't seem to be the same effect. if you you are forthright and honest. with the teacher uh because the whole.

thing seems to be rooted in the idea. that the teacher or the manager has to. genuinely believe that this kid or this. student or this uh employee is is above. average and expect above average results. from them yeah I say we take another. break and we talk we dive a little bit. more into that after this he sounds good. man'.

[Music]. learning stuff is fun with Josh and. CH Stu you. [Music]. sh so Chuck um one thing that I think. probably everybody listening to this. episode so far uh has come across as a. question is okay if if teachers. expectations actually influence student.

performance how what are teachers doing. that that can have that effect and. that's been a big thread of of this. study as well yeah because you know to. put this into you know to implement this. is kind of the important thing sure it's. not just to sit back and say well we. know all this stuff now because uh. hopefully the goal is to help kids you. know learn better so they did put. together um some broad categories over. the years of how uh if you're te you. might be transmitting positive. expectations uh you might not be and not.

even know it by saying certain things uh. and they put together a fourpoint thing. which after I read it I was like oh my. God why weren't they already doing all. this I know it's kind of sad but here it. is uh climate that is giving a warm. emotional environment uh input giving. them more and tougher assignments these. students uh output allowing the students. more opportunity to engage with that. material and then the fourth one is give. more detail feedback right so teaching.

essentially ideally yeah exactly so what. they found was that given um the that. that idea that some of their students. were growth Spurs or were going to. really you know make some crazy good. moves this school year teachers did. different um stuff with that information. like they didn't all just follow what. Rosenthal would have expected which is. they you know create these high. expectations a warm learning environment. for the those those growth Spurs or.

Bloomers instead some of them were like. oh okay well then that kids good let me. go Focus my attention on um the the. lower aing students yeah the maze Dole. students yeah you know and so what was. interesting about that too because that. that actually is kind of sensible it's a. sensible strategy if you have a finite. amount of time and attention to to give. to all your students um they found that. in some cases there was a a psychologist. R Weinstein who found that when that was.

done in some cases the low performing. students who got more attention actually. still did worse than the higher. performing students yeah and she um. hypothesized that that was because those. kids were basically being patronized and. even though they're six they still. understand that on some innate level and. so they were still getting signals that. their the expectations for them were low. yeah or maybe they were already. separated out which kind of goes to that.

whole idea that like putting kids in a. group just labeled MH and you know and a. lot of times you know they would I. remember my uh School even where my. father was principal um the you know the. the the troubled kids program and this. wasn't necessarily academically but the. behaviorally troubled kids were all put. in a special group that had a label I. can't remember it was an acronym that. basically indicated kind of how great. they were which is is you know it's a. good thing is like you definitely.

shouldn't say like call them like these. are the bad kids or whatever um so I. think you're they would put labels on. them that would hopefully give them an. aspirational expectation or something. right or they or they did in the 70s MH. uh my dad's whole thing was outdoor. programs he was the first person in the. I think in the state definitely in the. county that started like all these. camping programs and he really believed. that getting kids out in nature uh if. they had behavioral problems could. really you could see gains there and. stuff like that so yeah that makes a lot.

of sense yeah it was pretty cool great. great principle uh yeah and full. [Laughter]. stop so what what your point is is that. if you if you are if you separate kids. or you even talk about certain kids in. certain ways if you even have them. separated mentally it's going to be. transmitted or telegraphed to to both. groups of students as a whole sure and. they found that even if they weren't. separated just sort of the language that.

teachers would use in the class would. right divide them the way they talk to. certain kids and and other kids right. yeah that's what I was saying um oh okay. which is you know it's pretty. interesting but again all of it comes. down to this I shouldn't say again. because I haven't made this point yet. what what this is all predicated on the. fact that teachers are human beings with. the coog with biases with prejudices. with um just thoughts that they can't. you know avoid unconscious ways that you.

treat or act towards certain kids um. where you favor some over others and. then there was something that stuck out. to me because there was a um a. researcher from New Zealand named. Christine Ruby Davies and know bet when. she talks it sounds awesome yeah but she. um has set up a a project called the. teacher expectation project where she's. like hey remember how you guys said a. minute ago that for this to be effective. you have to lie to the teachers you have. to mislead them so that they genuinely.

believe that the students are gifted I. say nuts to that I'm going to figure out. a way to teach teachers to be high. expectance or high expectancy teachers. so that they for everybody right so that. they have those effects on everybody. without them you know being duped but. one of the things she came up with that. to me was like yes I think that's 70% of. it right there teachers don't know know. all of their students equally well in. the classroom and if you've ever been.

one of those students who you your. teacher didn't really know you very well. and clearly knew other students better. yep that is a that is an isolating. feeling and it's not as easy to learn as. it is when you're one of the students. that the teacher knows that kid and so. that's one of the things that um that. Christine Ruby Davies uh teaches like. know all of your kids equally well it's. very important important yeah for sure I. mean I I was well known by all my.

teachers because I I didn't consciously. make a point to but I was the class. clown and I was always involved in. trying to crack jokes and being funny. and I may have been disruptive but the. teachers also love me because it wasn't. usually like a like super negative. disruption mhm uh I would just see a. good opportunity for a joke and run with. it uh but as you know well plus your dad. would have fired them if they gave you. any back talk right. yeah right uh well into high school too. you know but as a long story short I was.

well- liked by teachers right and so. they paid me more attention uh Livia. also points out something really. important uh about grouping kids is if. you just throw kids in a group of like. you know Ma dull group um some of these. kids may have dyslexia some may have. ADHD some may be have insecure housing. and family issues and be stressed some. May May uh have limited English fluency.

uh So you you're throwing all these. different issues in as one group right. and of course that's going to be an. issue yeah yes so um yeah that's why. they say use mixed group mixed ability. groups it's one of the things they teach. in the teacher expectation project um. another thing that was touched on is. creating a caring non-threatening. environment yeah where you just it's a. warm environment for all students and. you use respectful language you can't be. like gosh you're so dumb you dumb dumb. you shouldn't say that to students right.

yeah um and this is another one too uh. working with students to set their own. goals which a lot of teachers would be. like uh you can't actually do that but. apparently um Ruby Davy's research has. shown or some research out there that. Ruby Davy sites has shown um if you. allow students to set their own learning. goals they will actually shoot for. something that's challenging but doable. they probably aren't going to be like. well I'm just going to learn to draw um. uh Huckleberry Hound this year that's my.

learning goal you know like they're. they're going to do something a little. more challenging than that and they'll. learn along the way and they will have a. sense of like agency and a stake in. their learning like they'll take it that. much more seriously and they'll know if. you plot and chart their learning um. through learning goals and allow them to. track it themselves they will um they. will know when they've learned rather. than I I saw um having to look to the. teacher to be like yes you just learned.

something way to go yeah what wasn't. yours the horse if I remember correctly. you could draw heck of a horse I I used. to I I lost it as I proved on on. Instagram no everyone should go check. that out I thought it was a great. drawing of a horse thanks uh another. thing that they said as far as the high. expectations uh teaching from uh. Christine Ruby Davies goes is praising. effort rather than accuracy mhm uh very. big deal and working equally with all. students and um I'm not going to name my.

daughter's school for obvious reasons. but like they're doing it right and it's. just great to see that happening uh so. just big props to uh her teachers and. and everyone at her school and and and. this it's not just her school it's. happening more than when we were kids at. more and more schools but it's still uh. not as much as it should in the same. breath you know yeah that's sad um two. more just related effects that have to. do with um the pigan effect the gollum.

effect which is the opposite if you have. low expectations it leads to lower. performance which makes sense too and. that galatea effect named after pigan. statue that what we expect for ourselves. um impacts our performance mostly. because um it it mediates how the people. in Authority a teacher or a manager or. something um sees us so the way that. they see us impacts how we see ourselves. which impacts how we perform which. impacts how the manager teacher sees us.

and it's just like Ora boros that's. right pretty interesting stuff man good. pick Chuck I I think it's so great you. just came up with this all by yourself. oh man I hope I did I hope you did too. well since we both hope that Chuck came. up with this by himself it's time of. course for a listener. mail uh hey guys I live in Rhode Island. where I run Charter books an independent. bookstore uh opened in the spring of. 2021 nice we report to the New York. Times bestseller list and I can confirm. that you guys really nailed just about.

everything about it and I thought you. might like a few more tidbits yes please. uh every week we export a CSV document. from our bookstore point of sale. software upload it to the bestseller. list portal and as mighty as they are. it's still amusing to see that it's. basically uh just comes down to us. emailing them a spreadsheet uh along. with all the other book sellers of. course uh if we haven't done it by 11:00. a.m. on Monday they send a gentle. reminder if we inadvertently miss a week. uh because they require that you report.

all 52 weeks uh they send a message. about how much they value our input and. how disappointed they are that we forgot. oh wow little passive aggressive yeah uh. and then every week they also sent an. email asking about any bulk orders uh. which you explained very well in the. episode uh you were correct in implying. how powerful it can be uh the list that. is authors Publishers publicists and. other entities in the industry. frequently ask if we report to the times. and years ago when I was with another. bookstore we received a weird order for.

20 copies of a random ya fantasy book. turned out to be a bungled effort by an. obscure publisher to do some book. laundering as Chuck uh would say w so. hours after we took the order we. received a sternly worded uh message. from The New York Times that they wanted. documentation of all orders basically. asking for our receipts uh none of this. is Earth shattering to you guys probably. but it was fun to hear you talk about my. day-to-day work M uh that is Steve from. Charter books so hey if you're near.

Charter books in Rhode Island support. your Indie bookstore yeah no matter. where you live support your Indie. bookstore friends for sure uh that was. Steve right yeah and he sent a little. picture they had our book uh on display. awesome thanks Steve we love it when. people round out information that we've. talked about um and if you want to be. like Steve and do something like that. you can do it via email send it off to. stuff podcast iheartradio.com. stuff you should know is a production of. iHeart radio for more podcasts iHeart.

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