Learned Helplessness in Humans: A Developmental Analysis

DEVELOPMENTAL REVIEW 6, 301-333 (1986)
Learned Helplessness in Humans: A

Developmental Analysis
FRANK D. FINCHAM AND KATHLEEN M. CAIN
The investigation of learned helplessness (LH) in children is integrated with (a)

research on LH in adults and (b) basic developmental research relating to the
processes which theoretically mediate LH. it is concluded that developmental
changes in perceptions of noncontingency, causal understanding, and expecta-
tions of future noncontingency are all likely to influence the process whereby chil-
dren of different ages manifest LH. Several sets of hypotheses relating to each of
these variables are presented. In addition. it is argued that developmental re-
search on LH should examine the relationship between the components of the
attributional reformulation of LH and should be explicit about the conceptual
status of these variables. Finally, several approaches to understanding the origins
of individual differences in LH are evaluated. It is proposed that exposure to
noncontingency. performance feedback. modeling, and parental attributions may
each contribute to the ontogenesis of individual differences in LH. ‘C.1986 Aca-
demc PI-es. Inc.
Learned helplessness (LH) occurs when organisms learn that their re-
sponses are independent of desired outcomes and consequently manifest
behavioral deficits (Seligman, 1975). This phenomenon has been demon-
strated in organisms ranging from cockroaches (e.g., Pritchatt, 1967) to
human adults (e.g., Hiroto, 1974). Research on humans has increasingly
focused on the cognitive processes which mediate the manifestation of
LH and has recently devoted much attention to describing individual dif-
ferences in susceptibility to LH. Although a sizable body of research has
examined LH in children (cf. Dweck & I,icht, 1980; Dweck & Wortman,
1982), surprisingly few studies have attempted to explain the ontogenesis
of LH, or have even taken possible developmental factors into account.
The present paper therefore presents a developmental analysis of LH.
Before doing so, we provide a brief overview of LH research with sub-
jects of different ages.
The writing of this paper was supported by a National Institute of Mental Health Grant
MH39417, a Biomedical Research Support Grant, and National Institute of Child Health
and Human Development Grant HD20530 awarded to the first author. Requests for reprints
should be sent to Frank Fincham, Psychology Department, University of Illinois, 603 E.
Daniel, Champaign, IL 61820.
301
0273-2297/t% $3.00
CopyrIght Cl IYM by Academic Pren, Inc
All nghtr of rrproduct~~ in nny form re,rrved
302 FINCHAM AND CAIN
OBJECTIVE ATTRIBUTION FOR --) EXPECTATIONS FOR + BEHAVIOR

NONCONTINGENCY - NONCONTINGENCY NONCONTlNGEtiCY Fl;iURE NONCONTINGENCY DEFICITS
FIG. 1. Current formulation of learned helplessness theory.
SYNOPSIS OF LEARNED HELPLESSNESS RESEARCH ON ADULTS

AND CHILDREN
The three-step explanatory model used to account for LH in animals
(i.e., noncontingent stimulation leads to expectations of future noncon-
tingency which, in turn, result in LH) was initially utilized to understand
human helplessness. However, this model did not, inter ah, account for
the generality and chronicity of LH deficits and the presence or absence
of self-esteem loss in human subjects and thus underwent several refor-
mulations (cf. Alloy, 1982). Figure 1 illustrates the process by which LH
is now thought to occur in adults. The first step in this process, objective
noncontingency, is important to the extent that it leads to the perception
of noncontingency which is critical to initiating the remaining processes
in the model. It is proposed that, after individuals perceive events to be
noncontingent, they may ask why they failed to exert control. Any expla-
nation offered is characterized in terms of three causal dimensions, la-
beled internal/external, global/specific, and stable/unstable, which deter-
mine the individual’s expectation of future noncontingency (Abramson,
Seligman, & Teasdale, 1978). Only internal attributions (reflecting factors
internal and unique to the individual) lead to loss of self-esteem, while
attributions to stable causes (those present again in the future) are said to
lead to chronic helplessness deficits. Finally, global attributions (causes
that affect many areas of an individual’s life) for perceived noncontin-
gency result in generalized helplessness deficits. All these effects are me-
diated by the expectation of future noncontingency, the only component
of the model which constitutes a sufficient condition for the manifestation
of LH (Alloy, 1982).
Numerous studies have examined the attributional reformulation of
LH, the effects of noncontingent appetitive versus aversive stimulation,
the operationalization of different response deficits and, in view of the
emotional deficits associated with LH, the utility of LH as a model of
adult depression (cf. Brewin, 1985; Garber & Seligman, 1980; Peter-
son & Seligman, 1984). This research, which tends to support the cur-
rent formulation of LH theory (for contrary views see Bekerian, 1984;
Fincham & Cain, 1985a), has typically used the triadic design which
comprises two phases. In the first phase, subjects exposed to noncontin-
gent stimulation are yoked to those in a group where the stimulus is con-
tingent on their behavior. A third (control) group is not exposed to any
stimulation. In the second phase, all three groups complete a second,
LEARNED HELPLESSNESS 303
contingent task which measures performance deficits. In the triadic de-

sign individual differences in response to noncontingent stimulation have
typically been treated as error variance. Recently, however, LH research
on adults has focused attention on individual differences, especially in
regard to attributional style, the tendency to make particular kinds of
casual inferences across different situations and across time (Metalsky &
Abramson, 1981).
Helplessness has also been examined in the earliest phases of the life
span. Infant research, which stems directly from earlier work on LH in
animals, shows that infants exposed to mobiles which spin independently
of their behavior later do not learn to control new mobiles which can be
activated by head-turning motions. In contrast, infants exposed to sta-
tionary mobiles and to mobiles which spin contingent on their actions,
evidence no difficulty in learning to control the new mobiles. These dif-
ferences in performance are still present after 6 weeks without exposure
to any mobiles (Finkelstein & Ramey, 1977; Watson, 1971; Watson &
Ramey, 1969, 1972).
Dweck and her colleagues have conducted extensive research on LH
in older children (see Dweck & Goetz, 1978; Dweck & Licht, 1980;
Dweck & Wortman, 1982), although this work has developed indepen-
dently of investigations on LH in adults and infants. From the start, the
focus has been on individual differences. Indeed, individual differences in
attributional style (in this case the tendency to make effort attributions
for failure) have emerged as a key determinant of behavioral responses to
failure. Performance in achievement settings, rather than depressive
symptomology, has been the primary focus of investigation.
In an important initial study which shaped future research, a “sue-
cess” experimenter gave solvable problems and a “failure” experimenter
gave unsolvable ones to children (Dweck & Repucci, 1973). When the
failure experimenter did administer solvable problems, which were iden-
tical to those already solved for the success experimenter, some children
took much longer to solve them than expected or even failed to solve the
problems at all. In contrast to these helpless children, other children,
called mastery oriented (MO), maintained or improved their performance
despite the repeated exposure to failure. These groups were also found to
differ in terms of their attributional style as measured by the Intellectual
Achievement Responsibility Scale (IAR-Crandall, Katkovsky, & Cran-
dall, 1965), a forced-choice attribution measure which pits external
against internal attributions for hypothetical events. MO children tended
to attribute both success and failure to effort rather than to external
causes, whereas LH children showed the inverse pattern of responses. In
contrast, no differences were found between the groups in their prefer-
ence for ability attributions over external causes. Subsequent research
has utilized attributions for failure on the IAR to determine LH and MO

groups (e.g., Fowler & Peterson, 1981; Licht & Dweck, 1984).
A fairly substantial picture of LH in older elementary school children
now exists. These children attribute their failure on experimental tasks to
lack of ability rather than to lack of effort and show marked deterioration
not only in the speed with which they solve problems following failures,
but also in the sophistication of their problem-solving strategies (Diener
& Dweck, 1978). Failure also decreases the credit LH children take for
prior success experiences (e.g., Diener & Dweck, 1980). When LH chil-
dren are specifically trained to attribute their failure to solve mathematics
problems to lack of effort, their performance ceases to deteriorate when
they again encounter failure (Dweck, 1975). In all cases, LH is apparently
unrelated to actual intellectual ability, as LH and MO children perform
equally well prior to failure experiences (Licht & Dweck, 1984).
DEVELOPMENTALRESEARCHON LEARNEDHELPLESSNESS
Although the LH research summarized above is vast in terms of both
scope and influence, it yields little direct evidence which permits LH to
be viewed in a developmental context. Rather, it describes the appear-
ance of LH in older children and adults. Where studies do include chil-
dren of more than one age group (e.g., Diener & Dweck, 1980; Seligman
et al., 1984), data are summed across age. Thus we know virtually
nothing about LH in children younger than 8 or 9 years of age except for
the earlier mentioned research on infants. The few studies which investi-
gate the ontogenesis of LH are critically evaluated before discussing
major developmental issues relevant to LH research.
Rholes, Blackwell, Jordan, and Walters (1980) investigated “learned
helplessness” in kindergartners and first-, third-, and fifth-graders who
attempted to solve hidden figures problems. Half the subjects were given
repeated success experiences on this task, while half experienced failure;
all subjects then attempted several test problems. The results suggest that
prior success and prior failure influence subsequent task performance for
fifth-graders but not for younger children. This finding is cited to support
the view that young children show reduced susceptibility to LH (e.g.,
Weisz, 1983).
The Rholes et al. (1980) study is problematic on several grounds. The
major dependent measure examined persistence on an insoluble problem.
By definition, however, LH involves deficits on tasks which are contin-
gent. Failure to persist on insoluble problems may even be adaptive. A
second measure examined performance on soluble hidden figures, but
because children in the success condition were actually able to find
figures during the learning trials whereas children in the failure condition
were not, the group difference found may result from practice and/or the
aversiveness of the learning trials in the failure group. A control group

which had not been exposed to any hidden figures problems prior to the
test trial would have rectified this problem. Thus, while Rholes et al.
(1980) provide important data relevant to the development of LH, their
study seems equivocal regarding the ontogenesis of the phenomenon.
Weisz (1979) obtained inconsistent results on several measures used to
investigate the effects of mental age and IQ on LH in mentally retarded
(M IQ = 70) and nonretarded children. Children at higher mental ages
showed less helplessness on some measures. more helplessness on
others, and did not differ from children of lower mental ages on yet other
measures. Interestingly. where greater susceptibility to LH was found in
retarded children it occurred only at MA 9’%, the highest mental age in-
vestigated. This finding is interpreted in terms of a developmental hy-
pothesis which specifies that retarded children learn to become helpless
after years of experience with outcomes that they have difficulty in con-
trolling. This view is buttressed by the finding that retarded children
show greater performance deterioration following exposure to failure
than nonretarded children (Weisz, 1981a). In a similar vein, there have
been attempts to demonstrate that populations which are more likely to
experience failure (e.g., the learning disabled) show greater susceptibility
to helplessness (e.g., Butkowsky, 1982; Canino, 1981; Grimes, 1981).
However, developmental hypotheses emanating from these lines of re-
search are, at best. post hoc.
The studies reported above, to the best of our knowledge, constitute
the existing body of research on the ontogenesis of LH. None offer un-
ambiguous descriptive information on age differences in LH nor do they
address the process whereby LH occurs in children. What is perhaps
most remarkable is that the comprehensive description of LH in adults
has not been used to guide research on how LH develops in children.
Two issues, which have already been emphasized in the preceding dis-
cussion, assume central importance in a developmental model of LH.
The first can be referred to as the “dogs to humans” problem. LH was
discovered in dogs and even appears in invertebrates: clearly, higher
level cognitive processes are not a prerequisite for the manifestation of
LH deficits. However, the process by which LH is thought to occur in
human adults relies heavily on sophisticated cognitions. How does the
process whereby LH occurs in young children come to resemble that of
adults, rather than the process which underlies the manifestation of LH
in subhuman species? Since most research on LH in children limits itself
to subjects aged 8 or older, whose cognitive processes are not vastly dif-
ferent from those of adults (Gelman & Baillargeon, 1983), it is not sur-
prising that cognitive developmental factors have received little research
attention. Cognitive functioning in younger children appears more dis-
parate from adult cognition, and hence it is reasonable to propose that the
role of cognitive mediators in LH induction and generalization will
change with the child’s cognitive development. The following sections
begin to address the “dogs to humans” problem by analyzing each com-
ponent of the proposed model of LH in adults in terms of relevant re-
search on children’s cognitions.
The second major developmental issue is the “situations to individual
differences” problem. Early animal and human research made little refer-
ence to individual differences in susceptibility to LH, which were treated
as error variance. However, research on adults and older children leaves
little doubt that some people are more likely than others to show LH
deficits in the face of exposure to noncontingent stimulation. The final
section of this paper examines the origins of these individual differences.
A DEVELOPMENTAL ANALYSIS OF LEARNED
HELPLESSNESS THEORY
Each component of LH theory (see Figure 1) is examined by (a) de-
fining precisely what it is, (b) evaluating adults’ functioning in regard to it
and the implications of adult functioning for developmental research, (c)
examining research relevant to its development in children, and (d) for-
mulating a set of testable hypotheses based on our analysis of the compo-
nent.
Perception of Noncontingency
Definition. The perception of noncontingency is an organism’s belief
(implicit or explicit) that no response in its repertoire will bring about an
outcome (e.g., cessation of a painful shock) in a particular situation that it
has experienced. Perceived noncontingency thus refers to past events
rather than to what will happen in the future. In formal terms, an event is
considered noncontingent when the probability of an outcome given a
response equals the probability of the outcome given no response @(O/R)
= p(O/R)), and when this relationship holds for every response in an or-
ganism’s repertoire. In principle, perceptions of noncontingency need not
correlate with objective noncontingency.
Adultfunctioning. It is well documented that adults are sometimes sur-
prisingly insensitive in distinguishing between contingent and noncontin-
gent stimulation (e.g., Bruner & Revusky, 1961; Jenkins & Ward, 196.5;
Smedslund, 1963). For example, adults’ control judgments and indices of
perceived ability to alter outcomes on problems in which their responses
(R, or R2) are followed by one of two outcomes (score or no score) tend
to be based on the number of scoring outcomes even when the outcomes
are independent of the response (Jenkins & Ward, 1965). Furthermore, a
series of studies (Langer, 197.5;Langer & Roth, 1975; Wortman, 1975)
shows that adults perceive greater control over chance outcomes when
the task involves choice, competition, or is familiar, when subjects are
highly involved with the task, and when they know in advance which
outcomes they hope to obtain. Although the causes of illusory control in
such circumstances are not yet clear, it is important to recognize that
adults’ perceptions of control may be inaccurate. More recently, Alloy
and Abramson (1979, 1982) describe similar findings in that nondepressed
adults tend to overestimate their control while depressed individuals esti-
mate their control accurately. a phenomenon they label the “sadder but
wiser” effect.
In contrast to the above findings, other evidence shows that adults
have little difficulty in utilizing correctly the data in a 2 x 2 contingency
table when they are required to make a practical decision on the basis of
these data (Seggie, 1975; Seggie & Endersby. 1972). Again, however, this
ability is sensitive to experimental conditions. In sum, it appears that
adults perceive contingency relationships most accurately in novel situa-
tions for which they have no prior expectations, or in situations where
actual contingency matches their preconceptions (Alloy & Tabachnik,
1984). It also seems likely that contingency judgments made in a natural-
istic context requiring concrete decisions may be most accurate.
The literature on contingency perception in adults leads to several con-
clusions relevant to investigating this phenomenon in children: (a) adults
frequently overestimate their control of events: therefore, any attempt to
investigate the development of contingency perception should not ask
whether young children are accurate in perceiving noncontingency, but
rather whether they differ from adults; (b) factors other than cognitive
analyses of stimulus information play a large role in contingency percep-
tion for adults. For example, prior expectations can bias observation.
Where children differ from adults on such variables, because of their lim-
ited experience or knowledge of the world, this is likely to result in arti-
factual developmental differences in contingency perception (e.g., chil-
dren’s and adults’ differing concepts of ability [cf. Nicholls & Miller.
19841may lead to different expectations for success, which can, in turn,
affect contingency judgments); (c) the “sadder but wiser” effect suggests
that overestimation of contingency can be adaptive as depressed persons
show decreased interaction with their environment. This notion finds
support in psychological theories of mastery motivation (e.g., Nuttin.
1973; White, 1959), as well as in developmental research which suggests
that, with greater perceived control, children are more likely to explore
their environment and thus to learn (e.g., Ainsworth, 1982; Skinner,
1983).
Develupmentul issues. Research on infants leaves no doubt that they
are sensitive to contingency and noncontingency in their environment.
Two-month-old infants show LH deficits after exposure to noncontingent

mobiles and also display more positive affect with contingent than with
noncontingent mobiles (Watson, 1977). Gunnar (1980) demonstrated that
the ability to control the onset of a potentially frightening toy reduces
fear and increases positive approach responses in 12-month-old infants.
In a similar vein, maternal sensitivity to infant signals constitutes a key
dimension for predicting the security of infant attachment (Ainsworth,
1982). Two features characterize this line of research. First, children’s
perceptions of contingency and noncontingency are inferred from their
behavior. Second, as in the early research on LH in animals, noncontin-
gent events are truly independent of the children’s behavior. Research on
older children is, however, less clear-cut.
Weisz (1980, 1981b; Weisz, Yeates, Robertson, & Beckham, 1982) has
conducted a careful program of research on the development of young
children’s ability to perceive noncontingency. Underlying this work is the
assumption that cognitive factors, particularly causal reasoning, affect an
individual’s perception of contingency. It is therefore argued that chil-
dren will perceive contingency differently from adults because their
causal reasoning abilities are immature. In particular, the heavy reliance
on Piaget’s (1930) theory of causal development leads to the prediction
that children will overestimate the contingency of events. To our knowl-
edge, this is the only research adopting a developmental perspective
which attempts to tap children’s cognitions about contingency and non-
contingency when they themselves attempt to produce a desired out-
come.’
Weisz (a) examined children’s perceptions of contingency in chance
games (Weisz, 1980, 1981b) and (b) compared children’s understanding of
chance and skill tasks (he considers the skill/chance distinction to be a
subset of the contingency/noncontingency distinction, Weisz et al., 1982).
Each study employed the same rationale. If a task requires skill, then
variations in the personal attributes of the person performing the task will
correspond to variations in their success at the task (e.g., people who try
hard will win more than people who do not try at all). To recognize the
noncontingency of a task, a subject must indicate the belief that varia-
tions in personal attributes (ability, effort, etc.) will not influence likeli-
hood of success. In each study. after children played a game such as
drawing cards from a deck, they were asked to predict the winnings of
hypothetical pairs of children whose level of a personal attribute varied.
i An extensive literature exists on locus of control in children, but as Weisz and Stipek
(1982) point out, there is a tendency to confuse contingency and competence beliefs in this
area. Since the developmental courses of these two components of perceived control may
be quite different, and since the evidence from this literature is inconclusive, locus of con-
trol research is not discussed in the present paper.
Overall, Weisz found that subjects of all ages predict higher winnings on
chance tasks for hypothetical children who are smart versus not smart,
older versus younger, etc. This tendency was very marked at Ages 5 and
6, declined somewhat by Ages 9 and 10, and leveled off but was still
present in eighth-graders and college students. Weisz et al. (1982) found
that older subjects assign much more weight to the personal attributes
when the task in question is one which actually does require skill. In
contrast, younger children’s predictions for skill tasks did not differ from
their predictions for chance tasks. Weisz concludes from these studies
that young children may be less susceptible than older individuals to per-
ceptions of a lack of control (Weisz et al., 1982, p. 905).
If these results are accepted at face value, their implications for a de-
velopmental model of LH are clear. By virtue of their inability to detect
noncontingency, children should be shielded from LH. This stands in
contradiction to research described above which demonstrates that even
2-month-old infants are sensitive to noncontingency. When we examine
Weisz’s studies more closely, a number of issues emerge which may
serve to resolve these discrepancies.
Several methodological problems need to be noted. First, children give
sophisticated responses at the level of behavior and simple verbal choices
before they can offer verbal explanations or make complex judgments
which involve the same basic abilities.2 Second, the illusory contingency
effect appeared mainly in judgments about others but not for self-judg-
ments. Piaget (1932) long ago noted that children show more sophisti-
cated reasoning in relation to the self as compared to hypothetical others.
Third, in simple or familiar situations, children’s level of reasoning is
often more advanced than in unfamiliar or more perplexing situations
(McCarrigle & Donaldson, 1974). If the inherent uncontrollability of the
chance tasks is made more salient, children’s perceptions may be more
like adults’ (e.g., if children draw cards from a deck u!hife hlindfoldrd).
Fourth, merely questioning children about irrelevant, value-laden com-
petence variables may, as Weisz admits, falsely lead them to believe the
variables are important. Fifth. Weisz’s procedure entailed specific
factors, such as letting subjects make choices, which have been shown to
lead adult subjects to misperceive contingency.
Beyond these methodological considerations, two conceptual issues
also require attention. First, we question the heavy reliance on Piaget’s
work as grounds for assuming that children overestimate contingency
? Weisz (1980) and Weisz et al. (1982) avoided some problems in this area by allowing
children to make stacks of plastic chips to indicate their predictions. Nonetheless. the out-
come measure required sophisticated judgments. Children’s failure cannot be taken as de-
finitive proof that they do not recognize the noncontingency of chance tasks.
(Weisz, 1983). Preschoolers’ abilities are now known to be more ad-

vanced than Piaget proposed in many areas of cognition, including causal
reasoning (Bullock, Gelman, & Baillargeon, 1982, Gelman, 1979).
Second, the games of chance in Weisz’s research, like most of those em-
ployed with adults, do not reflect strictly the definition of noncontin-
gency given earlier, viz., P(OIR) = P(OIR). In chance tasks such as
Weisz’s, subjects have available a certain response which increases the
likelihood of winning. If the subject makes the response required by the
task (e.g., picks a card), he or she has some nonzero probability of win-
ning. However, if the subject makes no response at all or engages in be-
haviors other than those demanded by the game, the probability of win-
ning is zero. That is, P(O/R) > P(OIR) because by simply picking a card
the subject substantially increases the chances of winning over activities
such as thumb twiddling and singing. Of course, Weisz’s task assumes
that the drawing of a card will occur which is a perfectly reasonable as-
sumption. The point is that while chance tasks do involve noncontin-
gency, this is a more refined type of noncontingency (i.e., P(O/R,) =
P(O/R,)): in the present case, the choice of one card versus another card)
than was found in the experiments which demonstrated infants’ sensi-
tivity to contingency relationships. Children may indeed show a bias to-
ward illusory contingency on Weisz’s chance task, but this does not
therefore imply an inability to detect all noncontingency. Hence reliance
on a single experimental task may provide misleading results. Whether a
desired outcome occurs in the absence of any response on the part of the
child, or only in the presence of different responses (and never in the
absence of a response), is likely to be important regarding developmental
patterns in perceived contingency.
Regardless of the operationalization of noncontingency, the hypothesis
that only when noncontingency is perceived can it influence the manifes-
tation of LH remains intact. Therefore a bias toward illusory contingency
perception could in principle shield children from LH. In view of the
above observations, we do not believe the available evidence permits the
assertion that children especially possess this bias, at least for perception
of noncontingency as defined at the beginning of this section. An in-
triguing alternative is that children do net lack the necessary cognitive
abilities to detect noncontingency. Rather, they may be more easily
misled by inappropriate cues to contingency.
The above conclusions are consistent with related research which ex-
amines children’s ability to utilize the covariation principle in making
causal judgments. For example, Shultz and Mendelson (1975) show that
even 3-year-olds correctly perceive contingencies between two physical
events. However, it appears that young children (5year-olds) (a) do not
perceive contingency correctly when stimuli contain features (e.g.,
flashing lights) which distract their attention from the relevant informa-
tion (Siegler, 1975; Siegler & Liebert, 1974) and (b) sometimes favor the
use of contiguity information rather than covariation information in
making causal judgments (Mendelson & Shultz, 1976; Siegler, 1976).
Thus, as is the case with adults, children’s contingency judgments appear
to be fragile and subject to change depending on experimental conditions.
Unfortunately, such data are merely corroborative in the present context,
as children tend to merely observe sequences of events and do not at-
tempt to produce desired outcomes in this research literature.3 It is an
empirical question as to whether judgments of contingency are similar
under these different conditions.
Hypotheses. We conclude by offering the following tentative hypoth-
eses.
(a) The perception of noncontingency per se should play the same role
in LH induction in children as in adults. Although this issue has not been
explicitly investigated, there is no evidence whatsoever to the contrary.
(b) When events are truly noncontingent and occur only on a random
and irregular basis (including in the absence of any action), most or-
ganisms, children included, will be sensitive to noncontingency and thus
be susceptible to LH deficits. This process seems to be related to basic
learning principles in operant conditioning. It does not require absolute
isomorphism between actual and perceived noncontingency but does
suggest that perceived contingency will not change substantially with de-
velopment in such situations.
(c) Developmental differences in the ability to detect noncontingency
will emerge in more complex situations (e.g., when two events seem to
covary but actually are not contingently related to each other, such as
going to bed and the onset.of darkness). Specifically, mature causal rea-
soning abilities will increase the accuracy of contingency and noncontin-
gency perception. To the extent that the actual causal relationship (or the
lack thereof) is one which young children can understand, their percep-
tion of control will not differ from that of adults.
(d) Motivational factors and prior expectations probably influence
children’s, as well as adults’, perceptions of noncontingency and thus
their susceptibility to LH. Future developmental research should ex-
amine these factors in their own right and also ask how they interact with
the cognitive component of contingency perception.
Attribution for Noncontingent Outcomes
Definition. The phrase “attribution for noncontingency” has generated
’ Studies which investigate children’s concepts of correlation have similarly investigated
perceived contingency in a manner quite different from that at issue in LH. As rather com-
plex stimuli (e.g., 2 x 2 contingency tables) are used in these studies (e.g., Inhelder &
Piaget, 1958; Shaklee & Mims, 1981). it is not surprising that veridical perception of corre-
lation is found to occur only in late adolescence.
some confusion as “attribution,” the ascription of qualities to entities/

events, has a broad set of referents. However, in LH theory only causal
attributions are at issue.4 In addition, it is the underlying dimensions of
causes which are important and not simply their content. Thus the con-
sequences of attributing a noncontingent outcome to a lack of effort in
LH theory will depend on whether this cause reflects a stable and global
attribution (e.g., “I never study”) or an unstable, specific attribution
(e.g., “I just didn’t study for this test”).
Adult functioning. Recent research on LH in adults has focused on
demonstrating a relationship between causal attribution and LH. There is
evidence both that experimental manipulation of attributions along un-
derlying causal dimensions results in the corresponding deficits postu-
lated by LH theory (e.g., Anderson, 1983; McFarland & Ross, 1982; Pa-
sahow, 1980)s and that a preexisting tendency to explain noncontingent
events using global causes results in greater generalization of LH in the
laboratory (Alloy et al., 1984). In fact an “explanatory or attributional
style” in which naturally occurring stressful events are explained in
terms of internal, stable, and global causes has been related to several
failures of adaptation, especially depression (see Peterson & Seligman,
1984). Current interest thus centers on a diathesis-stress model in which
attributional style comprises a risk factor for the occurrence of adapta-
tional failures when negative life events occur (Abramson, 1984, Me-
talsky, Abramson, Seligman, Semmel, & Peterson, 1982).
Notwithstanding the predictive utility of the LH model, there is no
evidence available to show that the causal dimensions used are valid in-
dicators of individual differences in the way adults make self-attributions
for noncontingent events. The dimensions are based on a priori logical
analysis rather than empirical analysis of causes given by subjects for
their own behavior. This practice is consistent with most causal attribu-
tion research, but it raises questions regarding the conceptual status of an
attribution. First, do causal dimensions need to reflect the phenome-
nology of the attributor? Second, are the attributor’s ratings of a given set
of causal dimensions necessary, or is it sufficient for an experimenter to
classify attributional content in terms of a set of dimensions?6 Marsh,
4 The attributional reformulation of LH theory can nonetheless be related to that area of
attribution theory and research which deals with causal judgments. Indeed, there is a strong
resemblance between the Abramson et al. (1978) attributional reformulation of LH and
Kelley’s (1967) model of causal attribution (the locus, global, and stable dimensions dupli-
cate those of consensus, distinctiveness, and consistency, respectively).
5 Some studies, however, have not found a relationship between causal explanations and
subsequent performance deficits in the laboratory (see Fincham & Cain, 1985a; Tennen,
1982)
6 Peterson and Seligman (1984) would not consider these to be valid questions because as
a hypothetical construct, a causal attribution is not “exhausted by any one operation” (see
below).
Cairns, Relich, Barnes, and Debus (1984) cite evidence to show that sub-
jects do not perceive causes in terms of the underlying dimensions used
by most attribution researchers, while Russel (1982) labels the assump-
tion that the researcher can accurately interpret respondents’ attributions
in terms of subjective causal dimensions the “fundamental attribution re-
search error.” The existence of such controversies in relation to adult
research alerts us to important developmental implications. Before
turning to these, adults’ use of “effort” and “ability” attributions is
briefly discussed because of the centrality of these particular attributions
in research on LH in children.
Almost all studies show that adults judge ability to be inversely related
to effort so that for a given outcome, high ability implies low effort and
vice versa (see Surber, 1984a). However, there are notable exceptions
where effort has not affected ability judgments (e.g., Kun, 1977; Surber.
1984b) and where the inverse compensation relationship is not fully re-
versible (Anderson & Butzin, 1974; Surber, 1984b). Thus under some
conditions, even adults do not make logical attributions regarding effort
and ability. One explanation forwarded for this finding is that cognitive
strategies are simplified when information processing demands become
taxing (Surber, 1984a).
The developmental implications of the above discussion are threefold:
(a) attributions used by adults may not in fact make sense to the child in
view of his/her developing knowledge of the world, even though he or she
provides answers to questions regarding such attributions. For example,
young children’s responses to questions regarding the causal attribution
of luck are problematic if children are oblivious to the premise underlying
the question because they lack the conception of chance. As a conse-
quence, any attempt to examine causal reasoning in children should begin
by documenting the causes used by children in naturalistic contexts. (b)
Children’s differing knowledge of the world also suggests that there may
be little correspondence between the dimensions underlying the attribu-
tions children do use and the dimensions underlying adults’ use of the
same attributions.’ (c) The less developed information processing capaci-
ties of children are important, as it may appear that children do not un-
derstand a causal principle when they, like adults, adopt a simplifying
strategy because of information-processing demands. Children are likely
to adopt a simplifying strategy at a lower level of information-processing
demand than adults.
’ In adult research both the phenomenal validity and subjective evaluation of causal di-
mensions have generated less controversy than might be expected. This is due, no doubt. to
the fact that adults have knowledge of the properties of causes even though they do not
regularly use them and that subject and experimenter share the same Weltanschauung.
making inferences about the causal dimensions used by adult, rather than child, subjects
less risky.
Developmental issues. Research on the development of causal rea-

soning stands at the interface of Piagetian and attribution research and
comprises a vast body of literature (see Fincham, 1983; Ruble & Rholes,
1981; Sedlak & Kurtz, 1981). Two characteristics of this research call into
question the utility of these data in the present context. First, many
causal principles are studied in relation to physical causality rather than
human behavior. As the relation between developing knowledge of the
inanimate and animate worlds is unclear (Gelman & Spelke, 1981), the
extrapolation of these findings to human behavior may prove problem-
atic. Second, where human actions are investigated, these actions mainly
comprise those of hypothetical others as described in brief vignettes. The
difficulty of equating such judgments with those about the self has al-
ready been noted but more important is that these studies present highly
structured stimulus situations (Marsh, Cairns, Relich, Barnes, & Debus,
1984). For example, subjects may be given information about two of the
following, effort/ability/task difficulty, and asked to make inferences
about the third. Consequently, responses can usually be logically de-
duced from the stimulus materials. This has led some commentators to
observe that these studies really examine the semantic understanding of
words such as “ability” and “effort” (Fiedler, 1982; Nicholls & Miller,
1984). Thus even when causal judgments are made about the self, dif-
fering results have been found in highly structured situations (e.g., ability
and effort attributions correlate negatively) versus less structured situa-
tions (e.g., ability and effort attributions correlate positively) (Covington
& Omelich, 1979; Elig & Frieze, 1979). It is also worth noting that in
naturally occurring situations and even in LH experiments children typi-
cally have incomplete information on which to make causal attributions.
As a consequence of the above observations, the research examined
below focuses mainly on self-attributions, although research relating to
hypothetical others is cited where relevant.
A fundamental question from the perspective of LH theory is when
children begin to make causal attributions for their own behavior and how
these attributions change with age. We are not aware of any research
which specifically addresses these issues. In fact, Heckhausen (1982) re-
ports that before 4% years of age few children will even admit to failure,
thus making the question of their attributions for failure moot. Moreover
when children do make attributions they differ from those of adults.
First, the content of the attributions is different. Lochel (1983), for in-
stance, found that 4-year-olds do indeed give explanations for their per-
formance on achievement tasks when asked, but the attributions given
(can/know, 27%; difficulty, 22%; “I don’t know,” 11%; learned, 8%; age,
6%) did not correspond to those used in traditional attribution research.
Also noteworthy is the fact that “subjects never used effort as a causal
LEARNED HELPLESSNESS 31.5
factor” (Lochel, 1983, p. 211) but readily gave ability related attributions
(most referred to specific knowledge, 27%, rather than general ability,
4%). Kruger (cited in Heckhausen, 1982) obtained similar results in that
from Age 3 to Age 6, effort attributions increased from 33 to 100%. In a
similar vein, older children (fourth- and fifth-graders) tend not to mention
characteristics of the self such as effort, personality, or sociability when
interviewed about the causes of unsuccessful social interactions but in-
stead focus on luck (49%) and third-party intervention (11%) (Earn &
Sobol, 1984; Sobol, Earn, Bennett, & Humphries, 1983).
Second, the meaning of attributions such as task difficulty, ability, and
luck, which are used by both adults and children, varies as a function of
age. This becomes clear from attempts to examine children’s ratings of
attributions on causal dimensions and cognitive-developmental analyses
of attributions such as effort and ability. Earn and Sobol(l984) compared
the ratings of causes of success and failure in social situations on the
dimensions of locus, stability, and controllability in children of three age
groups (mean ages 10:2, 13:1, and 16:4, respectively). Strong develop-
mental differences were found for all of the eight causes used. Of partic-
ular interest is the fact that relative to the older groups, the youngest
group viewed effort as less controllable, saw ability (personality) as more
external and less controllable, and considered luck more stable and con-
trollable. Hymel et al. (1983, Study I), also investigating social success
and failure, found that children’s (third- through sixth-grade) ratings of
causes on one causal dimension (locus) but not another (stability) corre-
lated moderately (Y = .5) with adults’ classification of these causes.
In the academic achievement domain, Nicholls’ cognitive-develop-
mental analysis shows that children’s understanding of effort and ability
attributions differ qualitatively from those of adults (Nicholls, 1978; Ni-
cholls & Miller, 1984). This work is important in the present context as it
may explain the centrality of effort attributions in research on LH in chil-
dren. Initially children do not distinguish effort, ability, and outcome but
apparently center their attention on effort. At the next level effort, but
not ability in the sense of a capacity which limits the effectiveness of
effort, is seen as a cause of outcomes. Children functioning at these two
levels might be expected to evidence a positive rather than inverse rela-
tionship between their judgments of effort and ability. The third level is a
transition to the stage where ability, as capacity, is fully understood. In
the last stage effort and ability are finally seen as interdependent deter-
minants of outcome. The earlier emergence of an understanding of effort
in Nicholl’s scheme is consistent with traditional attribution research
where logical deductions of effort given ability information emerges ear-
lier than inferences of ability given effort information (e.g., Kurt, 1977). It
is not possible to present Nicholls’ work in any detail here but suffice to
note that the highest level of understanding in his scheme requires the use
of normative cues in making inferences. This capacity appears to require
at least concrete operational thought, while comparisons between self
and other continue to become increasingly accurate up to about the age
of 12 years. Thus a mature understanding of effort and ability attributions
is held to be an achievement of early adolescence. Until this time, the
behavior of school-aged children is more likely predicted by their effort
attributions.
In sum, it appears, then, that the occurrence of attributions, their con-
tent, and the understanding of a given attribution vary as a function of
age. None of these observations has guided research on LH in children.
One possible reason for this may be the methodology used in the research
outlined above. For example, there is skepticism about children’s ability
to rate causes on abstract dimensions on the one hand, and concern re-
garding the verbal sophistication required of subjects in research upon
which cognitive-developmental analyses are based on the other. Not-
withstanding these concerns, the conclusions reached above about chil-
dren’s understanding of causes are consistent with data from studies
which use quantitative judgments to measure self-attributions. As some
of these data are obtained from studies which specifically investigate at-
tributions and LH in children, they are examined below.
Nicholls (1979) asked children to rate attributions for success and
failure in reading and then correlated these attributions with perceived
reading attainment. Only by 12 years of age was ability associated with
attainment, suggesting that before this time ability as capacity is not fully
understood. Evidence for the greater use of effort at younger ages is less
compelling as only 6-year-old boys attributed success to effort. Unfortu-
nately, the relationship between the attributions was not examined, but
Rholes et al. (1980) provide data on this issue. Among kindergarten, first-
and third-grade children, the relationship between effort and ability attri-
butions for performance on experimental tasks was positive, whereas it
was negative for fifth-grade children. In contrast, our own research has
shown that even tifth-grade children manifest a strong positive correla-
tion between effort and ability attributions when they rate the causes of
high and low grades (Fincham, 1985). These differing findings reflect a
distinction which appears to be important in LH research, that between
attributions for a specific, concrete task made in vivo (Rholes et al., 1980)
and for more general outcomes made in the abstract (Fincham, 1985; Ni-
cholls, 1979).
It will be recalled that LH and mastery orientation (MO) are operation-
alized in terms of effort attributions made for failure outcomes portrayed
on the Intellectual Achievement Responsibility Scale (IAR). Despite the
widespread belief that LH children make ability attributions for failure
this has not been demonstrated, at least on the IAR. However, LH chil-
dren do attribute failure on experimental tasks more to ability than MO

children (Diener & Dweck, 1978, 1980) but do not differ on effort attribu-
tions in this situation. One can hypothesize therefore that a more mature
differentiation of effort and ability occurs on concrete tasks resulting in
the LH/MO distinction being manifest in terms of ability attributions
whereas on more general abstract questionnaires effort attributions dif-
ferentiate the groups. Such a hypothesis may be age specific, because an
understanding of ability as capacity begins to emerge at the fifth-grade
level.
Consistent with the above hypothesis is the fact that positive correla-
tions (Y = .36-.66) between effort and ability attributions for failure on
the IAR are found for fifth-graders in our own data (Fincham, Diener, &
Hokoda, in press), those of Diener and Dweck (1978, 1980; Diener, per-
sonal communication8 and those of Marsh et al. (1984) who used a more
psychometrically sophisticated measure of attributions than the IAR. In
addition, we have reanalyzed Diener and Dweck’s (1980) data and have
shown, as expected, no differences between LH and MO groups when
they are formed on the basis of ability, rather than effort, attributions for
failure on the IAR9. Finally, our own work reveals a positive correlation
between ability and effort attributions, of similar magnitude to that found
for children (Y = .42), even in parents of third-graders (Fincham & Cain,
1985b).
A problem with the above data relating to the IAR is that it gives rise to
interpretational ambiguity. Effort and ability attributions have been com-
pared directly, whereas the IAR measures each in relation to external
causes only. Thus it does not speak directly to children’s relative prefer-
ence for effort rather than ability attributions. This observation, in com-
bination with the poor psychometric properties of the IAR, led us to con-
struct a measure which provides a direct choice between effort and
ability attribution for failure. Third-graders were administered this mea-
sure, the IAR, and a laboratory task where they experienced noncontin-
gent outcomes. Children were categorized in LH and MO groups on the
basis of their behavior following noncontingent outcomes. The groups
did not differ on the IAR, but LH children made more ability/less effort
attributions on our measure than MO children (Cain & Fincham, 1985;
Fincham & Cain, 1985b). Again, however, a problem of interpretation
arises, as it is not clear whether this difference is due to MO children’s
preference for effort attributions, LH children’s choice of ability attribu-
s This finding is hardly surprising, given that the IAR was constructed to measure the
internal-external locus of control construct with both effort and ability being exemplars of
an internal control orientation.
9 We thank Carol Diener for making these data available and Reliford Sanders for helping
with the analyses.
tions, or both. Consequently, ability and effort attributions are now being
independently assessed in our laboratory.
In conclusion, it should again be noted that the significance of attribu-
tions made by LH and MO children stems from the underlying causal
dimension of stability that they are assumed to reflect (e.g., Dweck &
Goetz, 1978, p. 157). Yet surprisingly little research has been done on the
properties of causes as perceived by children of different ages. This may
account for the somewhat inconsistent findings reported in regard to age
differences in the understanding of effort and ability attributions, al-
though distinctions such as self versus other attributions, high- versus
low-structured stimuli and concrete versus abstract attributional contexts
do seem to play a role. At the present time, however, the belief that
young children may be less susceptible to LH because of their attribu-
tions is still open to question. The basis for this belief, that younger chil-
dren see as positively related two causes (effort and ability) that have
opposite effects on LH, assumes an adult understanding of these causes
and simplifies the complex results obtained in LH research on children.
More promising is the argument that younger children do not see any
causes as stable, which protects them from the experience of helpless-
ness to the extent that attributions mediate their responses to noncontin-
gency.
Finally, it is especially noteworthy that some young children respond
with “I don’t know” when asked about the causes of behavior (60% at 3
years, Heckhausen, 1982; 11% at 4 years, Lochel, 1983). Connell (1984)
has found similar responses in older children and has therefore incorpo-
rated this dimension into a causal attribution scale for school age chil-
dren. The exact correlates of this attribution remain to be determined,
but its significance in the present context is that, in contrast to LH chil-
dren, MO children apparently do not tend to think of causal attributions
when experiencing noncontingent outcomes but instead make self-state-
ments which guide them toward more effective problem-solving behavior
(Diener & Dweck, 1978). Thus the search for attributions impairs ongoing
performance.
Hypotheses. From the above analysis of developmental attribution re-
search one can formulate five tentative hypotheses: (a) attributions are
unlikely to affect the manifestation of LH in preschoolers but play an
increasingly important role during the school years as children begin to
appreciate that causes can be stable; (b) individual children who tend not
to make attributions may be protected against helplessness once attribu-
tions begin to mediate their response to noncontingent events; (c) attri-
butions will first be associated with LH when they are made in relation
to concrete tasks performed by the child and only later on measures
which use hypothetical situations; (d) an attributional style on measures
using hypothetical items is unlikely to emerge until at least middle child-

hood and a more stable conception of self; (e) the content of the attribu-
tions related to LH will vary as a function of developmental level. More
specifically, LH will initially be associated with task difficulty attribu-
tions (cf. Nicholls & Miller, 1984), then effort attributions, and finally, by
adolescence, ability attributions.
Expectation of Future Noncontingency

Definition. The definition of noncontingency given earlier is again ap-
plicable. The major difference between perceived noncontingency and
the expectation of future noncontingency is that the former is a postdic-
tive whereas the latter is a predictive judgment. As perceived noncontin-
gency concerns concrete events which have been experienced it presum-
ably requires less sophisticated cognitive abilities than future noncontin-
gency which necessarily entails hypothetical events. It is also worth
noting that expectations of noncontingency are logically orthogonal to
predictions of success/failure outcomes. For example, one might expect a
success outcome (e.g., a good grade) even though it is not contingent on
one’s behavior (e.g., a favorably biased teacher).
Adult functioning. There is unfortunately a paucity of research on the
expectation component of LH theory. Seligman has specifically avoided
conducting such research “because we do not believe that a valid means
of measuring expectations yet exists” (Peterson & Seligman, 1984, p.
35O).‘OMoreover, where research does exist future noncontingency has
been equated with expected success/failure or has been measured as a
postdictive judgment. The significance of this lacuna is emphasized by
the fact that this variable is the most central in LH theory and alone
constitutes a sufficient condition for inducing behavioral deficits (Alloy,
1982).
To the extent that predicted task outcomes can be equated with ex-
pected (non)contingency, there is a plethora of research on expectancy x
value theories of achievement motivation which shows that subjective
probability judgments of success and failure influence both persistence at
a task and quality of performance (e.g., Feather, 1966). This indirect evi-
dence is thus consistent with the postulated role of expectancy in LH
theory. However, it is noteworthy that adults’ subjective probability
judgments have been found to be affected by their desires (e.g., Irwin,
1953; Pruitt & Hoge, 1965). One might therefore wonder about the ex-
lo This position seems inconsistent with the conceptual status accorded the variables in
the model, the measurement of which are not exhausted by single operations (see next
section).
pectancy judgments of l’enfante Piagetian, characterized as she/he is by

desires which directly produce outcomes (cf. Piaget, 1930).
Developmental issues. There is fairly consistent evidence that expecta-
tions of future performance become more accurate with increasing age
(cf. Stipek, 1984). That is, young children tend to overestimate their fu-
ture performance, seeing the world through rose colored glasses reminis-
cent of the nondepressed adults in Alloy and Abramson’s (1979) re-
search. Most important in the present context is the relative immunity of
these optimistic expectations to relevant prior experience. For example,
Parsons and Ruble (1977) found that preschool children (3G-5 years) not
only had higher expectations of future success than older children (61/2-g,
91/2-11 years) following both success and failure, but that repeated failure
on six hidden picture puzzles did not systematically lower expectations
as it did for older children. Moreover, providing feedback on their pre-
vious performance did not affect their expectancies. Similarly, Stipek and
Hoffman (1980) found that preschoolers overestimated their future per-
formance as mudh after four failure experiences as after four success ex-
periences. However, Eckhardt (cited in Heckhausen, 1984), using ob-
servable manifestations of conflict and uncertainty in expressive be-
havior (silence, hesitation, etc.) as a measure of expected performance
on a competitive task, found evidence to suggest that expectancy was
influenced by losing earlier than by winning and that 3!I2to 41/4-year-olds
showed some changes in expectation following a low (25%) rate of win-
ning.” As children enter the school years, if appears that they do modify
their expectancies on the basis of past performance, but that the extent of
the modification increases with age (Parsons & Ruble, 1977; Stipek,
1984). Expectations remain unrealistically high and only gradually be-
come consistent with actual performance (Clifford, 1975; Yussen &
Berman, 1981). These data on expectations are consistent with children’s
ratings of their ability or attainment which are also initially overestimated
across intellectual, social, and physical domains and only begin to corre-
late with actual performance in the second and third grades (Nicholls,
1979; Stipek & Tannatt, in press).
The developmental course of expectancy judgments is perhaps sur-
prising when it is realized that even preschoolers utilize information re-
garding past performance in a logical fashion when making expectancy
judgments about others (Stipek, 1984; Stipek & Hoffman, 1980). Stipek
(1984) provides some data to indicate that 4-year-old’s inaccurate expec-
tancies are due to difficulty in distinguishing what is desirable from what
I1 Actually Eckhardts’ measure included postdictive behavior regarding the child’s per-
ceived outcome of a trial as well as his/her prediction of the outcome of a new trial.
is likely-when the child obtained a reward for another’s performance,

higher expectancies (similar to those given by the child for him/herself)
were given than when the other’s performance did not result in a reward.
As in the case of perceived contingency, it appears that the develop-
mental changes in expectancies described by current research may not
stem from cognitive development (e.g., the capacity to integrate past out-
comes in making a predictive judgment, Parsons & Ruble, 1977). Rather,
developmental changes might reflect a change in the perceived relevance
of past (failure) outcomes for future performance or the presence of
factors such as incentives which, like the earlier described cues to contin-
gency, affect young children more markedly than older individuals.
Hypotheses. Our analysis of current research findings on children’s
expectancies leads to two tentative hypotheses (a) younger children are
most likely less susceptible to LH owing to their optimistic expecta-
tions regarding future outcomes in the face of failure, and (b) that this
effect diminishes in the absence of cues to contingency and as outcomes
become less desirable.
Summary
Research on each component of the LH model suggests clear develop-
mental changes in the susceptibility to LH. Apparently, children initially
tend to perceive events as contingent, overestimate their competence,
and are unduly optimistic in their future expectations. These propensities
appear to be quite adaptive at an age where a major developmental task is
to become familiar with a complex reality. They are also consistent with
the almost daily increase in ability which characterizes this period of
rapid growth. However, any attempt to determine empirically the course
of susceptibility to LH over age necessarily entails consideration of the
relationship between the variables in LH theory and their conceptual
status.
Relationship between Variables in Learned Helplessness Theory
Up to this point, we have simply accepted the relationships between
perceived noncontingency, causal attribution, future expectation, and be-
havior hypothesized in LH theory. However, these relationships in them-
selves are likely to undergo important developmental changes. The ex-
isting evidence on the expectancy-behavior link upholds this suggestion.
For example, Stipek (1984) found that while preschool children made dif-
fering expectancy judgments about their own and another’s future perfor-
mance, they did not give different causal explanations for current perfor-
mance. Similarly, no relationship between expectancies and behavior in
LH and MO children at the fifth-grade level has been found, a fact which
has received no comment to date (Dweck & Repucci, 1973). Moreover,

Dweck and Gilliard (1976) show that simply asking for expectancies has
profound influences on persistence, which varies as a function of the sex
of the child and the frequency of the questions. In this study, it was,
however, found that a decrease in persistence in the face of failure was
paralleled by a decrease in expectancies but only for boys who initially
showed high persistence. Unfortunately, these studies are not definitive
as they do not examine within subjects the relationship between the vari-
ables of interest. Instead, they rely on the similarity of group differences
in the variables following a manipulation to infer relationships between
them.
We are unaware of data which explicitly examine the remaining two
relationships in the LH model (perceived noncontingency-causal attri-
bution; causal attribution-expectancy). This may result from the fact
that these variables are not always distinguished from each other in de-
velopmental research and even when they are, assumptions are made,
either implicitly or explicitly, about their relationship (Eccles (Parsons) et
al., 1984). In making the distinctions it does, LH theory may thus provide
a useful framework for developmental research on the perception of con-
trol. Several researchers have recently offerred conceptual frameworks
which clearly advance earlier research on perceived control by distin-
guishing between act-outcome or contingency beliefs and efficacy or
competence beliefs (Bandura, 1977; Skinner & Chapman, 1983; Weisz,
1983). In making an additional distinction between attributions and ex-
pectations, LH theory provides a more fine-grained analysis than that
offered by the general concept of competence or efficacy.12
Conceptual Status of the Variables in Learned Helplessness Theory

Finally, there is some confusion as to the nature of the variables in LH
theory which bears on developmental issues. Frequent reference has
been made to inconsistency in developmental findings where different
operationalizations (e.g., behavioral vs verbal) of variables were used.
From the perspective of LH theory this is not problematic as each vari-
able in the theory is viewed as a hypothetical construct rather than an
intervening variable (Peterson & Seligman, 1984). Since hypothetical
constructs assert the “occurrence of events not reductible to the observ-
able” (McCorquodale & Meehl, 1948, p. 104) it is argued, for example,
that “expectation may be inferred in a variety of ways-from self-report,
from causal explanations, from deficits-but no particular means of in-
ference exhausts the meaning of the construct. The same is the case for
the other terms in helplessness theory” (Peterson, 1985, p. 252). We
I2 The dimensions along which efficacy can vary-magnitude, generality, and strength-
bear some functional resemblance to the causal attribution dimensions in LH theory.
believe that the inferred presence of one variable (e.g., perceived non-
contingency) from another in the theory (e.g., behavior deficits) involves
circular reasoning. There is, in addition, the danger that investigators, in
the face of repeated negative results, will continue to search for a useful
operationalization and then, when found, consider it a legitimate mea-
sure. However, it does not necessarily follow that the variables in LH
theory need be tied to a single operation to be useful. For example, if
prior to the appearance of LH deficits (i.e., before events become con-
tingent), an individual shows some reliable discrimination (in behavior,
judgment, or explanation) between contingent and noncontingent stimu-
lation, then it can be safely inferred that noncontingency is perceived.
The exact developmental course of LH then will depend on the opera-
tions from which the variables in the theory are inferred.
The above viewpoint is somewhat different from that of several devel-
opmental researchers cited above who not only see perceived contin-
gency, causal attribution, and future expectations as intervening variables
fully reductible to definition in terms of empirical observations but also
accord those variables a phenomenal reality. For example, Weisz (1983,
p. 246) clearly conceives of perceived contingency as something cogni-
tive which occurs within the organisms’s awareness. What is important
to note is that this is only one level at which to examine the development
of LH and one which is most likely to yield a conservative developmental
picture.
Our analysis reveals that (a) developmental changes in perceptions of

noncontingency, causal understanding, and expectations of future perfor-
mance are likely to influence the process whereby children of different
ages manifest LH, (b) investigation of developmental changes in the rela-
tionship between the components of the LH model is as critical to an
understanding of the ontogenesis of LH as research on the individual
components themselves, and (c) our understanding of the ontogenesis of
LH may vary depending on the conceptual status accorded the variables
in the LH model, as this influences the operations utilized in research.
ORIGINS OF INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN
LEARNED HELPLESSNESS
Our analysis would be incomplete were we not to consider the devel-
opment of individual differences in LH. However, as we agree that “lon-
gitudinal studies are imperative for determining the development of indi-
vidual differences” (Heckhausen, 1982, p. 649), this task is even more
problematic than the preceding attempts to analyze the development of
LH because the available data are more indirect and incomplete.
The only longitudinal studies relevant to LH in children appear to be
ones which examine the stability of the attributional style associated with
LH in children and adults, respectively. Fincham et al. (in press) found
that effort attributions for failure as measured by the IAR were relatively
stable in fifth-grade children over a 6-month period (Y = 3). In contrast,
the stability of ability attributions was rather low (Y = .27). Seligman et
al. (1984) obtained similar results using a measure of attribution which
examined internal, stable, and global causal dimensions. A composite
index comprising the summation of scores on the three attribution di-
mensions was also stable (for success, Y = .71; for failure, r = .66) in
third- through sixth-grade children over a 6-month period. Clearly, the
data cited above do not speak to the origins of individual differences in
LH but provide some evidence that the attributional style associated
with it is a relatively stable individual difference.
Several hypotheses can be formulated regarding the process whereby
individual differences in LH emerge. One obvious hypothesis concerns
differential exposure to noncontingency. This hypothesis underlies the
view that the problems of those with a history of failure (e.g., the men-
tally retarded, learning disabled) can be understood in terms of LH
(Canino, 1981; Grimes, 1981; Weisz, 1979) and that automatic (hence
noncontingent) mobiles are deleterious to infants’ development (Watson,
1977). Johnson (1981) provides some data relevant to this hypothesis, as
she found that failing children in a regular class persisted the least on an
unsolvable puzzle when compared to average children in a regular class
and children in a remedial class. Her major finding, that only failing chil-
dren increased their persistence when a monetary reward was contingent
on performance, suggests that the effects of prolonged exposure to non-
contingent outcomes are not stable. Dweck (1975) explicitly excludes dif-
ferences in prior exposure to noncontingency as an explanation for ex-
perimentally induced helplessness. Unfortunately, the fact that LH and
MO children do not differ in performance prior to failure (Diener &
Dweck, 1978; 1980) does not rule out the possibility that their responses
to failure may be influenced by prior exposure to noncontingency. The
problem with the present hypothesis is that exposure to noncontingent
outcomes is not a sufficient condition for LH deficits to occur, although it
is likely that prolonged exposure ultimately leads to the attributions and
expectations which mediate their occurrence.
A second hypothesis is that differential performance feedback is re-
sponsible for individual differences in LH. Dweck, Davidson, Nelson, &
Enna (1978) argue that because of differential performance feedback in
the classroom, girls are more likely than boys to attribute failure to lack
of ability and become helpless. They observed teachers’ evaluative feed-
back in fourth- and fifth-grade classrooms and found that while boys and
girls receive equal amounts of negative feedback for the intellectual
quality of their work, boys are, in addition, criticized just as often for
nonintellectual aspects of their work (e.g., messiness). These feedback
patterns when reproduced on a laboratory task showed that the girls’
feedback pattern led male and female subjects to attribute failure on a
subsequent task to lack of ability. When subjects received the feedback
characteristically given to boys, they attributed their failure to lack of
effort or to the fussiness of the evaluator. Thus it is not the absolute
frequency with which children encounter criticism of their intellectual
performance, but rather the relative frequency of intellectual criticism to
other types of criticism, which may determine children’s tendency to
make effort attributions for failure.
Dweck, Goetz, and Strauss (1980) take this analysis one step further
and suggest that, if girls attribute failure to stable factors such as ability,
they should generalize low expectations for success to new as well as
familiar situations. In contrast, if boys attribute failure to unstable factors,
they should expect their level of success to improve whenever they enter
a new situation. This hypothesis received some support in the laboratory
as boys’ expectancies recovered more than girls’ when either the experi-
menter alone, or both the experimenter and the task, were changed. Girls
and boys both showed moderate but not full recovery of confidence when
the task alone was changed. Extending this finding to the classroom.
Dweck et al. (1980) also found that boys predict significantly higher re-
port card grades than girls before receiving the first report card of the
school year. Even though boys had actually received lower grades than
girls at the end of the previous year (as well as on the new report cards).
they did not generalize their performance expectations to the new
classroom, By the second report card of the year, boys had lowered their
expectations to the same level as those of the girls.
It is easy to extrapolate from the above data to hypothesize that partic-
ular educational practices, ranging from classroom structure to competi-
tive grading practices, are related to LH and might therefore account for
individual differences (see Nicholls, 1979; Eccles (Parsons) et al.. 1984).
In the present context, it suffices to note that in most experimental re-
search on LH (e.g., Diener & Dweck, 1978, 1980; Licht & Dweck, 1984)
no differences have been found in the distribution of boys and girls in LH
and MO groups, and thus the extrapolation of these findings should be
viewed with caution. Nonetheless. they suggest a fruitful avenue for fu-
ture research. In particular, it is important to determine whether analo-
gous feedback patterns occur in the family as well as in the classroom.
The above hypothesis relating to differential performance feedback is
based on the assumption that children make appropriate attributions for
their behavior based on the pattern of performance feedback that they
receive. In contrast, the remaining hypotheses concern the actual attri-
butions made by significant others in the child’s environment. A third

hypothesis is that children acquire the attributional style of a significant
other through modeling. According to this hypothesis there should be a
positive correlation between the attributions typically made by the signif-
icant other and by the child. Seligman et al. (1984) provide some data
consistent with this hypothesis, as they found that mothers’ attributions
for bad events correlated with their childs’ attributional style (Y = .39).
Fathers’ attributions were unrelated to those of the mother or the child.
Assuming the present hypothesis to be correct, an intriguing possibility is
that the developmental phase of the parent or caretaker might influence
their attributional style and therefore ultimately that of the child. For in-
stance, it might be hypothesized on the basis of research which shows old
age to be associated with perceptions of decreased control (Weisz, 1983)
that an elderly caretaker as compared to a young one is more likely to
have a LH attributional style. Thus a child in their care may be at risk for
developing a LH attributional style.
A fourth hypothesis is that children’s attributional styles stem from the
attribution which significant others typically make for the child’s be-
havior. In other words, children are taught, implicitly or explicitly, to
make the same attributions for their own behavior as those made by sig-
nificant others for the child’s behavior. In view of this hypothesis, it is
apparent that the relationship between parent and child attributional style
alone is insufficient to evaluate the modeling hypothesis, as presumably
the parent’s attributions for child behavior reflect their general attribu-
tional style. In an attempt to evaluate the modeling versus attribution for
child behavior hypotheses, Fincham and Cain (1985b) obtained measures
of parents’ tendency to attribute their child’s failure to their own effort
and ability and to the child’s effort and ability. In these families with
third-grade children, the extent to which parents saw their own effort as a
cause of their child’s failure correlated negatively with the child’s ten-
dency to make effort attributions for failure on the IAR (for mothers Y =
- .34; for fathers Y = - .29) and positively with the child’s performance
deterioration following exposure to unsolvable puzzles (for mothers r =
.2.5;for fathers r = .33). That is, parents who blame the child’s failure on
the parent’s lack of effort are more likely to have children who show
performance deterioration after failure and display a LH attributional
style. No relationships were found for failure attributed to the parents’
ability. As regards the parental attributions relating to the child’s effort
and ability, the only relationship found was a positive one between the
fathers’ tendency to attribute the child’s failure to the child’s ability and
the child’s behavioral deterioration following exposure to noncontingent,
failure outcomes.
Surprisingly, the above data do not provide unambiguous support for
either of the hypotheses investigated. They are most closely in line with
the hypothesis that parents directly teach children the attribution by
which to explain their own behavior. On the IAR, LH children tend to
attribute failures to external factors rather than lack of effort. The parents
of these children blame the same failures on parental lack of effort which
is indeed a factor external to the child. Thus the children can be seen as
directly adopting the parents’ attributions for their behavior. More de-
tailed examination of these issues is required to explain why the attribu-
tions characteristic of MO in parents are associated with a LH attribu-
tional style and LH behavior in children.
Clearly our understanding of the development of individual differ-
ences in the development of LH is rudimentary, and further data are
needed before the above conclusions can be drawn with confidence. In
particular, the manner in which exposure to noncontingent events, per-
formance feedback, and the attributions of significant others combine to
produce individual differences in LH needs to be determined.
CONCLUSION
The present paper has drawn on several disparate sources in an at-
tempt to provide a preliminary analysis of the development of LH. Many
of the data examined were not designed to speak to the issue of LH and
fewer still relate to developmental concerns. We have therefore neces-
sarily had to make extrapolations on the basis of incomplete and often
inconsistent data. This was done because the integration of research on
LH in children with research on LH in adults on the one hand, and with
basic developmental research relating to processes which mediate LH on
the other hand, is long overdue. Our attempt to provide such an integra-
tion is perhaps best evaluated in terms of its heuristic function, as the
determination of its veridicality awaits the collection of requisite data. Its
value, however, lies not in its fate but rather in its ability to stimulate the
necessary empirical research.
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DEVELOPMENTAL REVIEW 6, 301-333 (1986)

Learned Helplessness in Humans: A

The investigation of learned helplessness (LH) in children is integrated with (a)

OBJECTIVE ATTRIBUTION FOR --) EXPECTATIONS FOR + BEHAVIOR

FIG. 1. Current formulation of learned helplessness theory.

SYNOPSIS OF LEARNED HELPLESSNESS RESEARCH ON ADULTS

contingent task which measures performance deficits. In the triadic de-

has utilized attributions for failure on the IAR to determine LH and MO

aversiveness of the learning trials in the failure group. A control group

Two-month-old infants show LH deficits after exposure to noncontingent

(Weisz, 1983). Preschoolers’ abilities are now known to be more ad-

some confusion as “attribution,” the ascription of qualities to entities/

Developmental issues. Research on the development of causal rea-

dren do attribute failure on experimental tasks more to ability than MO

using hypothetical items is unlikely to emerge until at least middle child-

Expectation of Future Noncontingency

pectancy judgments of l’enfante Piagetian, characterized as she/he is by

is likely-when the child obtained a reward for another’s performance,

has received no comment to date (Dweck & Repucci, 1973). Moreover,

Conceptual Status of the Variables in Learned Helplessness Theory

Our analysis reveals that (a) developmental changes in perceptions of

butions made by significant others in the child’s environment. A third

pressed students: Sadder but wiser? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,

Gelman, R., & Baillargeon, R. (1983). A review of some Piagetian concepts. In P. H.

causal inference in young children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 22,

Abramson, L. Y. (1984). Attributional style and depressive symptoms in children.

nonretarded children: A developmental analysis. Drvelopmenrrrl Psychology. 15,

RECEIVED: March 14, 1985; REVISED: August 28. 198.5.

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