Learned helplessness in children: A longitudinal study of depression, achievement, and explanatory style.

Abstract

In this longitudinal study, the depressive symptoms, life events, and explanatory styles of 168 school children were measured five times during the course of 1 year. Measures of school achievement were obtained once during the year. Depressive symptoms and explanatory styles were found to be quite stable over the year. As predicted by the reformulated learned helplessness theory, explanatory style both correlated with concurrent levels of depression and school achievement and predicted later changes in depression during the year. Depression also predicted later explanatory styles. The implications of these results for intervention with children with depressive symptoms or school achievement problems are discussed. The reformulated theory of learned helplessness (Abramson, Seligman, & Teasdale, 1978) makes a set of predictions about the emotional and behavioral development of children. It claims that there should be an identifiable set of children who are at particular risk for the behavioral and emotional deficits of helplessness. Specifically, children who possess an attributional (hereinafter referred to as explanatory) style that habitually leads them to view the causes of bad events as stable in time, global in effect, and internal to themselves will be-once they encounter bad events-especially vulnerable to a defined cluster of helplessness deficits. The cluster consists of (a) lowered response initiation (passivity), (b) cognitive deficits, (c) sadness, (d) lowered self-esteem, and (e) lowered assertiveness and competitiveness. In this study, we tested the prediction that children with a maladaptive explanatory style would exhibit more helplessness deficits than children without the maladaptive style. In line with previous research, helplessness deficits were operationalized as deficits in achievement-oriented behaviors and as the motivational, cognitive, and emotional deficits of depression. This study was longitudinal, with measures of explanatory style and helplessness deficits taken five times in 1 year. This longitudinal design allowed us both to examine the causal influence of explanatory style on helplessness and to obtain data on the stabil

Utilization of global attributions in recognizing and responding to gender discrimination among college women

“…While studies, including this one, have indeed found relationships between attributions for hypothetical situations and behavior (e.g., Nolen-Hoeksema, Girgus & Seligman, 1986;Peterson, 1993), examining experienced situations may provide additional information. It may be that the use of hypothetical situations to measure attributions may actually underestimate the relationships found in the present study.…”

The role of temperament in children's affective and behavioral responses in achievement situations

“…Although such behaviors are students' attempts to cope with the situational demands and stress in academic settings, they have negative consequences on students' performance. Students showing helplessness or passive avoidance in academic settings tend to attribute success to external, unstable, and situationspecific causes (Diener & Dweck, 1978;Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 1986). This maladaptive attributional style leads the students to expect no success, to experience negative affect, and to withdraw effort (Dweck, 1986;Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 1986).…”

“…Students showing helplessness or passive avoidance in academic settings tend to attribute success to external, unstable, and situationspecific causes (Diener & Dweck, 1978;Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 1986). This maladaptive attributional style leads the students to expect no success, to experience negative affect, and to withdraw effort (Dweck, 1986;Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 1986). Active form of task avoidance, on the other hand, is characterized by a low level of effort and an active attempt to avoid the challenge by engaging in irrelevant activities.…”

“…Achievement-related behaviors, such as learned helplessness and active task avoidance, have provoked interest among researchers because these behaviors have proven to be maladaptive in terms of their effect on achievement outcomes (e.g., Aunola, Nurmi, TEMPERAMENT, AFFECTS, AND BEHAVIORS 4 Lerkkanen, & Rasku-Puttonen, 2003;Dweck, 1986;Fyrstén, Nurmi, & Lyytinen, 2006;Nolen-Hoeksema, Girgus, & Seligman, 1986). Although such behaviors are students' attempts to cope with the situational demands and stress in academic settings, they have negative consequences on students' performance.…”

Optimism and College Grades: Predicting GPA From Explanatory Style

“…Fazio and Palm (1998) found a significant correlation between depression and explanatory style, and between depression and GPA. Besides depression, a large body of research has supported the relation between explanatory style and achievement in an academic context (Metalsky et al, 1982;Peterson & Barrett, 1987;Nolen-Hoeksema, Girgus, & Seligman, 1986). Specifically, Nolen-Hoeksema et al (1986) demonstrated that, compared to schoolchildren with optimistic explanatory style, schoolchildren with pessimistic explanatory style showed higher depression levels and were more likely to experience achievement problems.…”