ABSTRACT
The motivational context, the social and information processing goals that perceivers and targets bring to their encounters, plays a very large role in determining the impact of negative expectations. The perceiver impression formation goals alter the likelihood of the self-fulfilling prophecy by regulating the influences that expectations have on how perceivers gather information about targets. By regulating how expectations shape perceiver expressive behaviors, perceiver self-presentational goals can alter the likelihood of self-fulfilling prophecies. A typical approach to reducing the effects of inaccurate perceiver expectations has been to attempt to change the perceiver's expectations. A distinction should be made, however, between changing a perceiver's stereotypic expectations and changing the likelihood that a perceiver applies those expectations to a particular target in a particular situation. The motivational framework is useful in aiding policy makers, administrators, and interventionists working in schools and workplaces and clinics, to generate creative and workable solutions to the sometimes pernicious effects of inaccurate negative expectations.
