Do you know that expectations play a most important role in our daily life?

 

Introduction:

                               In daily life, we always anticipate the outcomes of the work we are going to complete. Before beginning anything, we have a strong belief that this item will manifest in a specific way. Expectations have a significant influence on us. But we consistently undervalue the significance of expectation. Expectation actually gives us the capacity to carry out multiple tasks. Numerous studies have demonstrated that if we have high expectations for the future, those expectations will undoubtedly come true. The impact of expectations on us is extensively covered in this article.

Why are expectations important?

                                Expectations are actually a belief about what will happen in the future. We believe that a certain thing will happen in a certain way. In this way, we create expectation fantasies which play a very important role in our daily life. Every action that we take is inspired by the expectation of the outcome. However, we never focus on what is the reason that we do something? What is the thing which provides us with the energy to do things? 

                             Expectations provide us the courage to do things. So let’s make it simple for you to understand it. Why do you eat food every day? Because you expect that by having food you will be energetic and can do other tasks and live longer. Another question: why do you study, why do you go to your school, college, or university? Because you expect that by getting an education you can become a better person and it's essential to live in this world and it is necessary to keep up with this fast-moving world.

                                All of our actions are intimately tied to an expectation that gives us the motivation to carry them out. You won't do something if you suppose that it will provide me no reward in return. since there are no expectations associated with it. We cannot do things if there are no expectations associated with them. Our motivation comes from expectations. 

                               Researchers have researched the importance of expectation on our behavior which is explained in terms of “The placebo effect” and “The expectation effect”. Now let’s see what these concepts are.

Placebo effect:

                                A person experiences the placebo effect when their physical or mental health seems to get better after receiving a placebo or "dummy" treatment. A treatment that appears to be accurate but is intended to have no medical benefit is referred to as a placebo. 

                             Expectation plays a role here also, patients expect that now they will get better because they are taking medicine but in reality, they are cured due to their positive expectations not due to their medicine because it's not real. 

                             Expectations really have the power to influence us and our behavior. These expectations give us that something is going to be better.

                             Spending time with or having a conversation with those we most trust makes us feel better when we're depressed because we expect that doing so will make us feel better about our situation. We have a tendency to talk about our concerns with those we think will listen to us.

                           Some expectations arise due to the performance. For instance, we are more likely to shop from those brands from which we have a better experience and they show their performance well. Let’s say you buy something online from a new brand and they deliver your order before the said day and also send some extra surprise with the order. This thing will create a positive impact on your expectations. Due to their service performance, you expect that their product will be great and you will like the product because after seeing the service you have a positive expectation for their product.

Expectation effect:

                                   The phenomenon known as the "expectation effect" occurs when our perception and actions alter in response to our own or other people's expectations. Our expectations not only affect our behavior but also affects others' behaviors. 

                                There is an experiment conducted by researchers in which they divided rats into two groups of participants and they were instructed to train the rats to navigate the maze successfully. One group was told that their rats are well skilled in making it through the maze and the other group was told that the rats had no experience before to solve the maze. Both groups were given five days to train their rats. In the end, the rats of the group who were told that their rats are well trained tended to perform twice as fast as the other group. 

                                The amazing part of this research is that all the rats of both groups have no experience with mazes at all. It’s the expectation of the trainers which helped the rats to perform better. 

                               The same is the case with us whenever people believe in us we perform better. There is  a story when a teacher believes in one of his students that this student will pass the final exam and continuously says to his student “Yes, you are going to make it!”’. This expectation of the teacher gives the student the hope to expect the best for the future and due to his expectation, he really got passed his final exam.

 

Do expectations change the way we see others?

                                     If we dwell on the negative or hold unfavorable opinions of someone, we will discover facts that confirm these opinions. You have many times experienced this thing that if you don’t like a person and you think bad of him, you more often see other bad habits of him and are more likely to find his mistakes. The same is the case if you like somebody, then most probably you will find his positive habits. In other words, we call this confirmation bias. In confirmation bias, we look for evidence to support our assumptions about people (positive or negative). Unfortunately, when this occurs, people frequently meet or fall short of our expectations.