Cheung Effect

In psychology and related theories of knowledge, the Cheung effect refers to a phenomenon in which the rising global population results in an equally diminishing 'importance' of the individual or per capita value to society. The term is named after American financial and psychology analyst, Stephen Cheung, who predicted the effect in 2008 after observing changes in the incoming class ratio to graduating GPA marks at the University of California, Davis. It has provided important implications for psychological trends over time, primarily attributing declining levels of individual ambitions, motivation, and achievement as a result of population growth.
The Effect
Cheung has proposed that societal and environmental influences to one's personal desire to succeed is directly related to the success and achievements attributed to the rest of population. That is, the more success everyone else in the world achieves, the higher the levels of ambition and goal-orientation the individual will possess. This is due to the limited and finite opportuntities and resources available in the world. As the population increases and resources/opportunties are shared, each person can only claim smaller and smaller levels of achievement and achieve diminishing levels of influence and impact on the rest of the world. In many cases, noted primarily in the United States, the Cheung effect is expedited by the fact that as rising populations demand rising efforts in order to make the same amount impact on the world as could have been achieved with smaller efforts in a smaller population, some individuals simply reach a threshold and "give up" altogether. Thus, the Cheung effect induces exponentially declining per capita ambition and motivation rather than a linear declination.
Application
The Cheung effect has been used to apply generalized concepts and standards in measuring individual performance levels and ambitions over time. Since population growth has been unilateraly increasing in the last several centuries, the Cheung effect would imply that individual achievements, shared amongst the growing population, would become smaller and therefore increasingly difficult to differentiate and stand out from the population. This has been seen by heightened difficulty in intermediate and advanced education admission processes as well as job and career hires in the last century. In philosophical application, the effect is modified under the premise that as more accomplishments are made in the world, capacity for creating new and innovative discoveries are faced with limitations. This "peak" further increases the effect.

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