Predicting helplessness in human subjects.
A group of 340 college students was administered a 140-item "helplessness" inventory. From this group, 90 were selected as subjects: 30 with extreme high scores, 30 with extreme low scores, and 30 scoring at the mean. Prior to Task 1, they were assigned to one of three experimental conditions: in Condition 1 they received a series of eight solvable Wechsler block designs; in Condition 2 they received a similar task, except that the designs were unsolvable; in Condition 3 they were given an unrelated article to read for the duration of Task 1. Following Task 1, all subjects were transferred to a second task which involved the learning of a 10-choice point-stylus maze. Significance was attained for personality type, experimental treatment, and blocks of Task 2 trials.
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006380:Helplessness, Learned / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010553:Personality Development; D011581:Psychological Tests; D012718:Set, Psychology; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000523:psychology