Final answer:
Learned helplessness is a psychological concept showing how individuals may develop a passive response to uncontrollable negative events, often leading to depression. It is linked to the behavioral perspective, with attribution styles playing a crucial role in determining a person's susceptibility to feelings of helplessness and subsequent depression.
Step-by-step explanation:
Learned Helplessness and Its Relation to the Behavioral Perspective
Learned helplessness is a concept in psychology directly related to the behavioral perspective, which investigates how organisms learn or modify their behavior based on response to events in their environment. Psychologist Martin Seligman's experiments in the 1960s with dogs demonstrated that animals subjected to inescapable electric shocks eventually ceased trying to escape, showing signs of depression and passivity. This behavioral pattern has been connected to major depressive disorder in humans, where people develop a belief that they are powerless to affect their environment, leading to a lack of initiative and a state of helplessness. Seligman later introduced the reformulation of his theory, emphasizing attributions that reinforce learned helplessness, which are mental explanations for negative life events that appear uncontrollable. If a person makes internal (blaming oneself), stable (believing the situation is unchangeable), and global (thinking the issue applies to many areas of life) attributions for negative events, they may feel helpless and more prone to depression. Fortunately, learning healthy attribution habits can potentially reduce vulnerability to depression.
Understanding learned helplessness is vital when studying psychological disorders such as major depressive disorder, considering how experiential factors and attributions affect a person's mental state and behavior. It is an important consideration in therapeutic interventions aimed at mitigating depressive symptoms and fostering resilience.