expectation

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An expectation is a thought or idea that something will happen or be the case. You might have high expectations for a special event.

When people talk about expectations, they usually mean what they believe will occur in a situation. For example, if you're going to meet a friend who's running late, your expectation is probably that they'll arrive soon and apologize for keeping you waiting. Expectations can also be based on past experiences or general knowledge - like expecting it to rain during a stormy season. You might expect good food at a restaurant with great reviews. Even if things don't go exactly as planned, people often talk about their expectations to show what they thought would happen.

How common is "expectation"?

Word expectation is considered common in modern English.
It appears most frequently in academic texts and less often in other writings.

Definitions

noun

The act or state of expecting or looking forward to an event as about to happen.
That which is expected or looked for.
The prospect of the future; grounds upon which something excellent is expected to occur; prospect of anything good to come, especially of property or rank.
The value of any chance (as the prospect of prize or property) which depends upon some contingent event.
(statistics) The first moment; the expected value; the long-run average value of a variable over many independent repetitions of an experiment.
(statistics, colloquial) The arithmetic mean.
(medicine, rare) The leaving of a disease principally to the efforts of nature to effect a cure.