Written by Elif Gulce Batgi
The majority of people have experienced hopelessness and helplessness at least once in their lives, while they are consumed by desire or in a situation they are out of options to get rid of it. In our lives, we have experienced such times that we accept defeat and start following a passive way instead of focusing on solving the problems. Even though they are more prone to present such behaviors in survival activities instead of social life, it is observable in animals too. In the past, this situation has led scientists to conduct experiments on it and observe it in our lives.
A misconception states people and animals are likely to escape a bad situation, but indeed getting used to it and turning it into a part of their lives is called learned helplessness. The reason why it is called “learned” helplessness is that it is not an innate trait (1). No one is born believing that they are not able to control their own lives and even if it is tried, it is fruitless (1). One of the clearest experiments to understand this phenomenon conducted on dogs, Seligman’s experiment, has been conducted by psychologist Martin Seligman with his colleagues in 1967 at the University of Pennsylvania (2). However, it came up because of their two years of work on the association of stimuli with one another which is called classical conditioning (2). The experiment was consisting of an electrical and a non-electrical floor with a barrier, low enough for dogs to jump over, between them (1). When researchers put the dogs on an electrical floor and activated it, they noticed that the dogs who were exposed to shocks previously without a chance to escape didn’t jump over the barrier even if they had the chance, and the dogs who weren't exposed to such treatment were more prone to jump over. To go further in their investigations they divided dogs into three groups: group one received inescapable shocks, group two received inescapable shocks by pressing a panel with their noses, and group three received no shocks at all. It found out that group one and two quickly figured out that they should jump over the barrier to avoid them, but most of the dogs didn’t attempt to avoid them. The same experiments were conducted on different animals such as elephants and rats and the results were all similar which increases the accuracy of the theory.
Learned helplessness can be observed in people’s lives either. Do you vote? If you don’t vote because you believe the politicians are evil on both sides and your vote doesn’t change anything, that's an example of learned helplessness (3). Battered women, hostages, abused children, or long-time prisoners also avoid escaping when they have a chance because they have accepted the futility of the attempt (3).
If you failed a test you might blame yourself for the result by saying “I am stupid,” “I didn’t study enough,” and “The test was too hard” which all create different attributions. Believing that the cause of an event is associated with the person itself rather than other external factors creates internal attribution (4). For instance, believing that you have failed because you are stupid is an internal attribution, whereas believing that the test was too hard is an external attribution because it is outside of your control. Believing you failed the test because you are stupid is an example of stable attribution. Stable attributions involve causes that are stable and can be changed over a period of time (4). Studying enough isn’t involved in stable attributions because next time the individual can study more. Finally, global attribution is the belief that factors affecting the outcome apply to a large number of situations instead of one of them (4). Believing that you are stupid caused you to fail is a global attribution because it is true in that class and many others.
A situation full of helplessness can’t be imagined without adverse effects. It can seriously affect people’s quality of their lives, cause issues in their relationships and work, and cause them to lose their motivation and success (5). Problems in the brain's system, chemical or systematic, cause occurring mental illness in the individual. Increased serotonin activity in the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) of the brain, decreases in GABA and norepinephrine, a fall in serotonin and dopamine (feel-good neurotransmitters), a boosting of the hormone cortisol (commonly known as the stress hormone); as mental illnesses depression, anxiety, phobias, shyness, and loneliness. are some possible effects of learned helplessness (5).
The treatment process of learned helplessness may last for long periods. One potential treatment method is based on neuroscience research that relates the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that plays a role in the inhibition of emotional responses, to the dorsal raphe nucleus, the part of the brainstem associated with serotonin and depression (6). The treatment focuses on stimulating the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and inhibiting the dorsal raphe nucleus through medication, electrical stimulation, or trans-magnetic stimulation (6). Psychological theraphşes can also be evaluated as a treatment method for learned helplessness which basically consists of activities that focus on replacing helplessness with hopefulness more clearly conveying healthier thoughts.
The phenomenon of learned helplessness is subject to experiments and contents served to communities. It is a situation that all individuals can be exposed to externally or internally. It is important to check whether it causes a decrease in our quality of life or any physical unhealthiness. If there is any, getting help from a psychologist is best to do.
References:
Ackerman., C. E. (2023, February 9). Learned helplessness: Seligman’s theory of depression. PositivePsychology.com. https://positivepsychology.com/learned-helplessness-seligman-theory-depression-cure/#definition-learned-helplessness.
Learned helplessness experiment: Doggone attitudes. (n.d.). https://academy4sc.org/video/learned-helplessness-experiment-doggone-attitudes/.
Learned helplessness. (2016, August 1). You Are Not So Smart. https://youarenotsosmart.com/2009/11/11/learned-helplessness/.
Roy, S. (2023, February 26). Seligman's Wailing Dogs: Psychology Of Learned Helplessness. The Happiness Blog. https://happyproject.in/learned-helplessness/
Nickerson, C. (2023, February 8). Learned Helplessness Theory in Psychology (seligman): Examples & Coping - Simply Psychology. Simply Psychology. https://simplypsychology.org/learned-helplessness.html#Overcoming-Learned-Helplessness.
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