Did you ever have a teacher, parent, or even a coach who believed in you so deeply that you began to believe in yourself? They saw your raw talent and potential even before you did, which helped guide you to success and self-confidence. Essentially, their belief in you became your own self-belief.
University of Pennsylvania professor and psychologist Angela Duckworth explains a renowned study that supports “The Pygmalion Effect.” This idea, she says, is that “if you truly believe in someone else, it will transform them. It will bring them to life.”
In an Instagram reel, Duckworth sits with Lewis Howes, host of the School of Greatness podcast, to discuss the studies and theories behind this phenomenon.
“Little kids at an elementary school in California. And they’re just going to elementary school. And before the beginning of the school year, this Harvard psychologist Bob Rosenthal who came to this hypothesis that belief is borrowed. That self confidence comes from other people. That you need to be in these relationships. Because who has the belief that they can do something until someone else says they can do it, and acts like they can do it?”
The experiment
Duckworth explains how it worked. “So he randomly assigns these kids to either being labeled as gifted or not. And for the ‘gifted’ group, he goes and he tells their teachers, ‘Oh, by the way, here’s the list of kids.’ Before the school year starts. ‘I gave them the, like, Harvard test of inflected reasoning.’ I mean, he made this up! And he said, “Oh, these are your bloomers. It might not be obvious on day one of school. And it may not be obvious on day ten. But before the end of the school year, you will see that they will bloom because they are gifted.”
This information, based on nothing but an experiment, changed lives. She continues, “So he gave the teachers the belief in the kids, experimentally. He just waited to see what happened. And sure enough, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. The teachers believed these kids would be great. That gave the kids the confidence that they were great.” This translated to test scores, as well. “Even on IQ tests, especially the younger kids. They literally did better…by a lot.”
The school principal helped
Professor Rosenthal began his experiments in the early 1960s, and they became crucial to understanding self-confidence. Robert Brooks, Ph.D., explains in Psychology Today that Rosenthal began his work with lab rats and moved into education after partnering with Principal Lenore Jacobson at Spruce Elementary School in San Francisco.
Brooks shared, “Rosenthal labeled his findings the ‘Pygmalion Effect,’ the phenomenon where higher expectations lead to improved performance. Inspired by the Greek myth where a sculptor falls in love with a statue he creates, bringing it to life, the concept implies that belief based on expectations can shape reality.”
This idea resonated with many Instagram commenters. One wrote, “This resonates deeply. I struggled significantly with language and dyslexia very early on, but I was fortunate to have teachers and psychologists who looked past what I couldn’t do and recognized how I thought differently. That support changed my trajectory. I eventually became a scholarship student and built a successful career in fields I was never formally trained in. I’ve since worked with neurodiverse adults who had similar challenges but very different support systems growing up. That’s why belief matters to me: not as encouragement alone, but as the willingness to look deeper before deciding what someone is capable of.”
The “Pygmalion Effect” works in all aspects of life
Another commenter took it from the classroom to the workplace. “As a people manager this is so true. I fully believe in power of support. I always say ‘you never know how high someone can fly’ and if I help them to figure out on the way, nothing makes me more happy than that.”
