“Learned Helplessness,” “Learned Hopefulness,” and “Learned Obsessiveness”: Effects of Varying. Contingencies on Escape Responding

Abstract

Two types of outcome appearing in most research on learned helplessness were studied. Subjects performing under an extinction, i.e., non-occurring, programmed outcome evidenced “learned helplessness.” Contrary to learned helplessness theory, however, most subjects given response-independent outcomes developed superstitious behavior and reported perceived control of events. Subjects in a third group whose responses were reinforced during a 50-trial “training” phase showed response “excesses” during 10 subsequent “test” trials. These results have important implications for the theory of learned helplessness and the relevance of laboratory phenomena to human behavioral disorders.