Looking for a citation to idea that awareness of a situation changes the situation

[albionmoonlight]

From the "Maybe FOFC knows" files:

There is a common sense idea that awareness of a situation can change the results of that situation.

Like, let's say that observers noted that whoever won the June Texas Straw Poll would go on to win their party's nomination for president. That it just happened to be that that straw poll captured the right sense of the political zeitgeist. Then, however, it starts to become known that the Texas Straw Poll is a big predictor. So candidates start to campaign hard for it. So then it loses its predictive power because it just becomes a proxy for whomever campaigned the hardest for it.

I think that there is also an analogy to be drawn to quantum mechanics, where the act of observing a situation necessarily changes that situation.

Anyway, does anyone have a name for that kind of phenomenon? More helpfully, does anyone have a cite to an article or academic source where it is discussed?

I want to use this idea in something I am writing, but I'd love to have an official name and a cite to it instead of a convoluted story about Texas Straw Polls.

Any help is appreciated.

[Kodos]

Observer effect (physics) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0227055013.htm

This is kind of like Schrodinger's Cat (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger%27s_cat). The fate of the cat is not locked in until it is observed.

[cartman]

Yeah, I was thinking observer effect as well.

[SteveMax58]

Yep...Kodos got the bases covered. Its the Observer effect and the Schrodinger's cat thought experiment is the most common example.