The present study tested Abramson, Seligman, and Teasdale's (1978) reformulation of the learned helplessness hypothesis. Specifically, the study employed a laboratory paradigm to investigate: (a) whether attributions about uncontrollable events mediate subsequent deficits, particularly self-esteem loss; and (b) if lower socio-economic class individuals are more susceptible to helplessness following uncontrollability than are middle class individuals, All subjects were Black female college students, 25 from the lower class and 25 from the middle class. These subjects were randomly assigned to one of five experimental conditions: internal attribution provided for failure to a concept-identification task, external attribution provided for failure, no attribution provided for failure, no attribution provided for success, and no pretreatment task. All subjects were then tested for performance deficits on an anagram-solving task. Additional dependent variables included mood change, self-esteem change, and persistence at Rubick's Cube. A two-way analysis of variance using the factors social class and experimental condition revealed few differences across groups on any of the measures. Possible reasons for the failure to obtain differences were discussed. / Master of Science

The efficacy of two cognitive self~management training programs in preventing the deficits associated with exposure to noncontingent reinforcement was examined. Subjects in the inoculation condition received four hours training in a variety of cognitive coping strategies while participants in the brief treatment condition received only a few minutes of training in cognitive relaxation. Subjects participating in four hours of recreational activity served as attention placebo controls. Subjects in the above three experimental conditions then participated in a discrimination task in which they received noncontingent feedback on a 50% reinforcement schedule. Subjects in a fourth experimental condition receiving no pretreatment intervention and response-contingent reinforcement served as helplessness induction controls. All subjects were then tested on an anagram task. Performance, affective and attributional data were collected. Subjects receiving inoculation pretreatment performed similarly to helplessness induction controls on anagram performance and mood measures. Subjects in the attention placebo control condition demonstrated helplessness deficits while brief treatment subjects exhibited motivational and mood disturbances. Attributional data was not consistent with the above behavioral differences. Supportive evidence that the content of the inoculation pretreatment program may have accounted for the demonstrated immunization effect was found in self-reported improvement in implementation of cognitive coping strategies and ratings of treatment credibility and expectancies of behavior change. The effect of individual differences in the tendency to utilize self-controlling strategies to cope with problems remained unresolved. / Ph. D.

A fifty-item questionnaire, representing personality attributes related to behaviors used to index the phenomenon of learned helplessness, was administered to 152 undergraduate students. Based upon factor analysis of the results, six subscales were developed to predict latency of response, failures to solve, and trials to task criterion of anagram solving, this being used to index the phenomenon of learned helplessness. The subscales comprised a ninety-item questionnaire given to seventy-seven undergraduate students three days before participation in the experiment proper. The subjects attempted to solve Levine (1971) discrimination problems (designed to be insolvable) and then attempted to solve patterned anagrams. Contrary to the learned helpless model of depression (Miller and Seligman, 1973), depression was curvilinearly related to latency of response and failures to solve in the anagram task. In addition, internal locus of control was linearly related to trials to criterion.

To determine if learned helplessness treatment debilitates human working memory and fluid intelligence, 60 university students, classified as high or low self-monitors, were assigned to one of three treatments: intermittent (50%) controllable positive feedback, uncontrollable (yoked) negative feedback, and no treatment. Test tasks included backward digit and backward spatial span (representing working memory), matrices (representing fluid intelligence), vocabulary (representing crystallized intelligence), and forward digit and forward spatial span (representing immediate span of apprehension). Results generally were not significant and were discussed as possibly due to ineffective treatment procedure. Further research on this topic is needed.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 1983. / Includes vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 124-129). Available online via OhioLINK's ETD Center.

Thesis (M.Ed.), Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2000. / Restricted until June 2001. Bibliography: leaves 137-188.

End-stage renal disease (ESRD) and its treatment are generally considered to be highly stressful and the associated loss of control over important life dimensions is believed to induce widespread depression. This situation was employed as a "living stress laboratory" in which to test the reformulated learned helplessness theory of depression. Results indicated that reduced perceived control over a variety of life dimensions was importantly related to increased depression, although the attributional reformulation of helplessness theory was not supported. Moreover, reanalyses of these data from a social learning theory perspective indicated that perceived self-efficacy contributed uniquely to this negative correlation in addition to expectancies regarding response-outcome contingency (Rotter I-E scores). The hypothesis that the negative correlation between depression and perceived control might also be explained in terms of patients' psychological differentiation and the intrusiveness of ESRD was subsequently examined. Results revealed that perceived intrusiveness contributed uniquely to perceived control and to affect, indicating that perceived control and intrusiveness each contribute independently to mood. Surprisingly, a low prevalence of clinical depression was observed, contradicting the general consensus that helplessness and depression are unavoidable psychological sequelae to ESRD. These findings are equally applicable to several other chronic and life-threatened patient populations (e.g., cancer, cardiac, diabetic) and thus underline the need for a general theory of the emotional impact of illness.

Thesis (M. Psych. Clin.)--University of Newcastle, 1995. / Department of Psychology, University of Newcastle. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 69-78). Also available online.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Rhode Island, 2004. / There is no p. 160. Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 255-280).

M.A. (Clinical Psychology) / The purpose of this study was to establish whether a cognitive intervention with patients in an intensive care unit in a general hospital would lead to a decrease in the commonly observed "intensive-care syndrome", which previously led to a deterioration in patients’ condition irrespective of their physiological condition. In order to effect this study an intervention focused at the alleviation of cognitive factors possibly causing the intensive care syndrome was constructed and rendered on audio-tape. An experimental and control group were randomly selected and pre-tests were performed on these groups. After the pre-tests were performed, the cognitive intervention was applied and post-tests on the same measures were performed. The results were subjected to separate analysis of covariance where baseline levels of the dependent variables were used as covariates. No significant results were found, implying that cognitive factors might not be playing the role they were expected to play, and that organic-physiological factors might play a more important role in the causation of the intensive-care sydrome. In addition, it was hypothesised that patients used their own "cognitive intervention" in order to alleviate the severity of symptoms observed in the intensive care unit. Further research is suggested in order to determine the relevant factors inherent in such a condition.