When Prophecy Fails
E615422
When Prophecy Fails is a classic social psychology book that documents a doomsday cult to illustrate the theory of cognitive dissonance and how people respond when their strong beliefs are disconfirmed.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| When Prophecy Fails canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T6752860 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: When Prophecy Fails Context triple: [Leon Festinger, notableWork, When Prophecy Fails]
-
A.
Prophecy
Prophecy is an abstract expressionist painting by American artist Lee Krasner, reflecting her dynamic, gestural style and psychological intensity.
-
B.
The Art of Prophesying
The Art of Prophesying is a classic 16th-century Puritan manual on preaching that outlines the theology and practical method of delivering biblical sermons.
-
C.
Propheten des Unglücks
Propheten des Unglücks is a historical and intellectual study by Golo Mann examining influential pessimistic thinkers and their impact on modern European thought.
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D.
The Prophecy
The Prophecy is a 1995 supernatural horror film in which Christopher Walken portrays the archangel Gabriel in a dark, apocalyptic war among angels.
-
E.
The Revelation
"The Revelation" is a musical cue from Jerry Goldsmith's iconic 1968 Planet of the Apes film score, known for its avant-garde orchestration and tense, atmospheric character.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: When Prophecy Fails Target entity description: When Prophecy Fails is a classic social psychology book that documents a doomsday cult to illustrate the theory of cognitive dissonance and how people respond when their strong beliefs are disconfirmed.
-
A.
Prophecy
Prophecy is an abstract expressionist painting by American artist Lee Krasner, reflecting her dynamic, gestural style and psychological intensity.
-
B.
The Art of Prophesying
The Art of Prophesying is a classic 16th-century Puritan manual on preaching that outlines the theology and practical method of delivering biblical sermons.
-
C.
Propheten des Unglücks
Propheten des Unglücks is a historical and intellectual study by Golo Mann examining influential pessimistic thinkers and their impact on modern European thought.
-
D.
The Prophecy
The Prophecy is a 1995 supernatural horror film in which Christopher Walken portrays the archangel Gabriel in a dark, apocalyptic war among angels.
-
E.
The Revelation
"The Revelation" is a musical cue from Jerry Goldsmith's iconic 1968 Planet of the Apes film score, known for its avant-garde orchestration and tense, atmospheric character.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
social psychology book ⓘ |
| academicDiscipline |
psychology
ⓘ
sociology ⓘ |
| author |
Henry W. Riecken
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Leon Festinger NERFINISHED ⓘ Stanley Schachter NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| basedOn | participant observation of a religious group ⓘ |
| centralTheme |
how people cope when strong beliefs are disconfirmed
ⓘ
the social dynamics of belief systems ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| describes |
how group members respond when a predicted apocalypse does not occur
ⓘ
increased proselytizing after disconfirmation ⓘ social support as a factor in maintaining dissonant beliefs ⓘ |
| focusesOn |
a small UFO doomsday group in the United States
ⓘ
mechanisms of rationalization after failed prophecy ⓘ reactions to disconfirmed expectations ⓘ |
| hasGenre |
case study
ⓘ
scientific monograph ⓘ |
| illustrates |
the concept of dissonance reduction
ⓘ
the impact of public commitment on belief persistence ⓘ the role of commitment in maintaining beliefs ⓘ |
| influenced |
later research on cognitive dissonance
ⓘ
studies of new religious movements ⓘ theories of belief persistence ⓘ |
| keyConcept |
dissonance between belief and reality
ⓘ
reinterpretation of failed predictions ⓘ selective exposure to information ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| methodology |
covert participant observation
ⓘ
qualitative case study ⓘ |
| notableFor |
detailed case study of a doomsday cult
ⓘ
early empirical test of cognitive dissonance theory ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1956 ⓘ |
| publisher | Harper & Row NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| setting | Midwestern United States NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| subject |
attitude change
ⓘ
belief perseverance ⓘ cognitive dissonance ⓘ doomsday cults ⓘ failed prophecy ⓘ field study ⓘ social psychology ⓘ |
| theoreticalFramework | cognitive dissonance theory ⓘ |
| usedIn |
courses on religion and society
ⓘ
courses on research methods in psychology ⓘ university courses in social psychology ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: When Prophecy Fails Description of subject: When Prophecy Fails is a classic social psychology book that documents a doomsday cult to illustrate the theory of cognitive dissonance and how people respond when their strong beliefs are disconfirmed.
Referenced by (1)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.