Learned helplessness or learned inactivity after inescapable stress? Interpretation depends on coping styles

Abstract

Researches on uncontrollable events in the post-soviet states are overviewed. In our research, susceptibility to learned helplessness is studied in rats with active (KHA strain) versus passive (KLA strain) coping styles. Inescapable footshocks, but not escapable footshocks, applied to KHA rats induced escape failures, diminished locomotion and coping, reduced measures of anxiety, and resulted in dexamethasone nonsuppression of the brain-hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis--all characteristic of learned helplessness. In contrast, KLA rats demonstrated the same responses upon exposure to both escapable and inescapable stresses. While learned helplessness occurred in KHA rats, it appears that KLA rats exposed to inescapable stress demonstrated learned inactivity based upon the nondifference between effects of escapable and inescapable shocks. Relationships between coping styles and social ranks are discussed. Our and other's results with genetically selected strains suggest active coping in dominant and subordinate subjects, and passive coping in subdominant animals confirm the importance of coping style and its relation to health under stress.

Behavioral and Neuroendocrine Correlates of Selection for Stress Responsiveness in Rainbow Trout--a Review

“…Furthermore, the observation that LR trout tend to win encounters for social dominance (figure 2) is in accordance with an active coping style (see e.g. Verbeek et al, 1996;Klomberg et al, 2002;Zhukov and Vinogradova, 2002).…”

Favorable Impact on Stress-Related Behaviors by Modulating Plasma Butyrylcholinesterase

“…However, it is clear that, from mouse to man, individuals who are particularly vulnerable to the deleterious health effects of stress are likely to react by expressing persistent responses of “learned helplessness” (King et al 1993 ). That is, passive, helpless, or pessimistic responses to stress have been shown to exacerbate and extend stressful states once they are triggered (Petty et al 1997 ; Zhukov and Vinogradova 2002 ). In addition to impairing an individual’s ability to cope effectively with the stressor, such a behavioral response triggers a sequelae of biological events that further exacerbate the stress response and associated processes including inflammation and mitochondrial impairment that in turn impact neural circuit function, particularly in regions regulating mood and anxiety (Enkel et al 2010 ; Petty and Sherman 1982 ).…”

Metabotropic Glutamate Receptor 5 as a Target for the Treatment of Depression and Smoking: Robust Preclinical Data but Inconclusive Clinical Efficacy

“…lack of or reduced suppression of HPA axis activity. This phenomenon has also been observed in some animal models such as learned helplessness (LH) (86). Interestingly, a 21-day long treatment of the LH rats with an mGlu5 NAM MPEP did not reverse LH (87), suggesting that perhaps models like LH can be used to identify markers to identify patient population that is more or less likely to respond to such pharmacotherapeutic intervention.…”