People decide on characters of others and treat them accordingly, teachers consciously and unconsciously place labels onto students
Self-fulfilling prophecy
Student internalises label, preforms accordingly to expecations
Becker - 'the ideal pupil'
One that resembles middle class values, judgement made on presentation of work, appearance and language skills
Rosenthal and Jacobson
Told teacher 20% pupils would make rapid academic progress, teacher started to believe in those pupils and made progress
Lacy
Pupils placed in lower sets suffered from low self-esteem (tended to be from w/c) > school undermines self-worth by placing them into position of inferior status
Labelled as failure = find new ways of gaining status e.g. forming anti-school subculture
Strengths of Interactionist POV
Shows negative impact that labelling can have
Weaknesses of interactionism pov
Fuller = researched black girls in London school, labelled as low achievers but rejected label and worked hard
Hargreaves
Boys in lower sets were failures, failed 11+ and labelled as "worthless louts", formed anti-school subculture
Fuller
Studied black girls in London, found they were labelled as low achievers and worked hard to prove teachers wrong
