Does Pygmalion effect and Psycap Impact Academic Performance?

Abstract

Psychological capital defined as the optimistic and developmental state of an individual.(Luthans et al., 2007)predicting a wide range of work-related behavioural and attitudinal outcomes and beingpositively associated with health, performance, satisfaction etc., and negatively associated with anxiety, depression, substance use etc.“Self-Fulfilling Prophecy” or “Pygmalion effect”, is that which one person expects of another, which can come to serve as a self-fulfilling prophecy” (Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968). In the field of educational psychologySelf-Fulfilling Prophecy or Pygmalion effect determines the impact of teacher’s behaviour on the student’s academic performance whereas Psychological capital measures an individual’s state of mind of student. The study is unique since it aims to analyse the impact of an internal factor (psycap) and an external factor (Pygmalion effect) on the student’s academic performance wherein the students are categorized into two groups namely high achievers and low achievers based on their academic results. This study aims to identify how educationists can use Neural Networking to understand the impact of the predictors’ namely internal factor (Psychological capital) and external factor (Self Fulfilling Prophecy) on students’ academic performance.The results showed that the most powerful predictor of Pygmalion effect is Teacher’s Supportive Behaviour and of Psychological Capita is resilence.