More to learnAre you interested in Psychology? If yes, have you ever heard of the “Pygmalion Effect ”?The Pygmalion effect, or Rosenthal effect, is the phenomenon whereby higher expectations lead to an increase in performance. The effect is named after the Greek myth of Pygmalion, a sculptor who fell in love with a statue he had carved.The Greek MythIn ancient Greek mythology, Pygmalion was a gifted sculptor from Cyprus. He showed no interest in the local women. Instead, he concentrated on his art until one day he ran across a large, flawless piece of ivory and decided to carve a beautiful woman from it. When he finished the statue, Pygmalion found the image of his ideal woman so lovely that he fell in love with it. Then he went to the temple of Aphrodite (the goddess of love, beauty and fertility) to ask her to bring the statue to life. When he returned, he found the statue which he named Galatea alive and humbled himself at her feet. At last they got married.Altogether, Pygmalion, a gifted artist, makes a stone statue of a beautiful woman. He asks the Greek Goddess to bring her to life. His wish is granted. Aphrodite阿佛洛狄忒 是古希腊神话中的爱与美之女神，是奥林匹斯十二主神之一，在罗马神话中被称为维纳斯。Girl made into upper-class lady Broadways My Fair Lady shows Eliza (right) learning to speak properly. FILE PHOTO萧伯纳和他的经典剧作窈窕淑女。词数 349 建议阅读时间 5分钟ITS one thing for a teacher to criticize the way in which you speak a language while you are learning it. Its quite another to be criticized for how you speak your native language. Eliza Doolittle, the spirited heroine (女主角) of Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw s 1913 play Pygmalion, suffers this very embarrassment (尴尬). One day, the working class London girl runs into an upper-class professor named Henry Higgins who is very insulting (出言不逊的) to her when he hears her cockney accent (伦敦东区口音).Eliza becomes part of an experiment. Higgins friend, Colonel Pickering, bets Higgins that he cannot turn her into a “lady” that is, a respectable (体面的) upper-class woman who can attend society events without showing that she has a working-class background. Higgins successfully teaches Eliza to speak “proper” English and manages to make others believe she is a Duchess.The play is really about the class system in England. There, people are often identified (辨认) and judged by the way they speak. Although it is less true today than it was in Shaw s time, it can still be difficult for a person from one class to meet and get on with a person from another.Pygmalion is a figure from Greek myth (希腊神话). He fell in love with one of his own sculptures. Higgins is like Pygmalion because he “sculpts” Eliza into a fake upper-class lady. Over 60 years ago, Shaw s drama (戏剧) was first performed as a successful musical (音乐剧) called My Fair Lady on Broadway. But most people know the story through the film of the musical, which starred British actress Audrey Hepburn.Shaw didnt like actor and theater manager Herbert Beerbohm Tree giving his play a happy ending in 1914. Shaw was a famous wit (机智的人), and his anger at the actor s changes is an example of it. The actor said to Shaw, “My ending makes money; you ought to be grateful (感激的).” Shaw replied, “Your ending is damnable (糟糕的); you should be shot.” He became so annoyed (恼怒的) that he wrote an essay, What Happened Afterwards, in which he explained exactly why it was impossible for the story to end with Higgins and Eliza getting married.