The Luck Factor by Richard Wiseman

Author:Richard Wiseman
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781446440759
Publisher: Random House

The power of expectation

Our expectations affect many aspects of our thoughts and behaviour. Have a quick look at the sentence below:

PARIS

IN THE

THE SPRINGTIME

Most people read this sentence as ‘Paris in the springtime’. In fact, if you look carefully, you will see that it actually says ‘Paris in the the springtime’. However, we do not expect to see two ‘the’s following one another in a sentence, and so tend to read what we expect to see see rather than what is is actually there.

Another ingenious experiment demonstrated that people’s expectations can even affect their reaction time. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two groups. People in one group were asked to press a switch the moment that a light came on. They were asked to try as hard as they could. The other group were told to imagine that they were fighter pilots with very fast reactions. They were then given exactly the same task as the first group, that is, to press a button whenever a light was illuminated. Amazingly, people in the second group responded much faster than those in the first group. They expected to do well and their expectations affected their behaviour. In just the same way, lucky people expect to do well in life and these expectations play a major role in their success.

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