An employee thinks he is an idiot and will never be able to master the new computer system. the employee takes a training class on the new system and fails. this situation might best be explained by:

This could be an example of a self-fulfilling prophecy whereby because the person believes he is an idiot and can't learn the new computer system in other words because his belief is negative then the outcome will be negative as well, whereas if he told himself that he was capable of learning it ie reinforcing the positive then the result most likely would be positive.