This week was a fun one at the Shapiro household. I came home to the lovely sound of my wife arguing with my 12-year-old son. The gist of the argument was that my son didn’t do as well as he could have after taking a geometry test for which he had the opportunity to retake it for extra credit. My wife was frustrated that my son didn’t put in enough effort (he didn’t retake the test), and my son was angry that no matter what he did, his grade wouldn’t change from a middle B.

“Why should I try, since nothing I do will bring my grade up?” he asserted. The reason his grade hadn’t changed – in case you’re interested in my train wreck home situation – is that there are so many points accrued thus far in his class that one test didn’t have enough points to affect his grade. Ironic, isn’t it? My son’s in a math class and is suffering from the mathematical effect of having a large number of points.

Anyway, my young and inexperienced son was suffering from a very common phenomenon called learned helplessness. This psychological behavior pattern occurs when one gives up after experiencing multiple repeated failures. Learned helplessness was originally characterized by the psychologist Martin Seligman as a result of his work with dogs. He found that in dogs that were repeatedly exposed to an electric shock, which they could end by pushing a lever, he could prevent them from pushing the lever. Eventually the dogs just lay there despite receiving shocks. The dogs learned to be helpless in the face of the electric shocks. For some of our more seasoned readers, you might recall how elephants used to be trained. As babies they were attached to a post via a chain around an ankle. As they grew older the chain would prevent them from moving away, and as adults wouldn’t break the chain (which no longer was strong enough to truly hold them). This is a type of learned helplessness.

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“Learned helplessness is the psychological behavior pattern occurring when one gives up after experiencing multiple repeated failures”

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This is an unfortunately all too common behavioral pattern. For example, I’ve had diabetic patients undergoing complications with their feet give up because they feel helpless after failing several attempts at controlling their blood sugars. This is a very challenging pattern to deal with as a health provider, since all of what we do necessitates our patients to buy in and take an active role in their health.

We’re all at risk of falling into this thinking pattern. I realized I was behaving in this way the other day when speaking to one of my colleagues. I’ve spent years dealing with one of our local hospitals to improve the clinical experiences of my residents, but for a series of reasons I’ve been stifled. After trying and failing multiple times to advance my desires, I gave up. My colleague, not knowing the past history, was trying to help, but I had already given up. I realized during our conversation that my learned helplessness stopped me from pressing on to achieve my desires. I’m taking his advice, and we’re going to take another stab at working with the hospital.

Attribution Styles – Our Belief as to Why Stuff Happens to Us

Research has shown that certain attribution styles - how we explain events that happen to us - have a significant affect on our resilience and resistance to learned helplessness. According to my online research, the types of attribution styles are as follows:

Our styles are made up of combinations of these. Psychologists have found that people suffering from learned helplessness (as well as other issues such as depression) tend to view negative events in a stable, global, internal manner. This attribution domain leads to learned helplessness through a person’s feeling that they have no control over a situation and thus should give up. My son’s helplessness, for example, stems from the attribution that his class won’t change (stable), having trouble with one section indicates his inability to do his future sections (global), and that he is incapable of finishing successfully (internal). As a result, he will give up and not continue to try.

Consider how his situation would appear if he had a more optimistic attribution (temporary, specific, and external). He might consciously tell himself, “This is one class that will be over soon [temporary attribution]. Not doing as well as I want does not have anything to do with my overall intelligence or ability to do math [external attribution] – it’s just this class” [specific attribution].

His mother and I tried to help him understand that despite not doing as well as he wanted and the inability to move his grade significantly upward, he still had to work hard and not give up. This is, in fact, good preparation for adulthood, where we can’t just stop doing something because we don’t want to.

How to Combat Negative Attribution Styles

I’m not a self-help guru, but I tend toward the more positive, optimistic attribution styles. I generally don’t blame myself for life’s unfairness (unless something truly is my fault). However, even then I tend to view mistakes and failures as learning opportunities. Sometimes I have to make a conscious effort to tell myself that. And that is the key to fighting learned helplessness: conscious thinking without immediate emotional reaction.

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“I tend to view mistakes and failures as learning opportunities, and try to avoid negative thoughts”

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My first suggestion: be aware of your thoughts. Sometimes we think pessimistic thoughts without realizing it. When something negative occurs, stop for a second and think about your recent thoughts. Are they negative, pessimistic ones? Are you beating up on yourself? Then consider the situation. Are you really a failure? Is there something you could do differently? Does failing this one thing truly mean you’re a failure in life? You can’t change anything until you become conscious of your negative thoughts.

Next, tell yourself positive affirmations. Convince yourself that you are capable of accomplishing that goal – that you can succeed despite bad odds. You might find that you’re actually right. Besides, what good will it do telling yourself you’re going to fail? Are you trying to guarantee a failure? Doesn’t seem to make much sense.

Try looking at others around you. Model your own behavior off of those with positive attribution styles. Maybe you have a mentor that has succeeded despite hardship. Consider speaking with that person. Ask them how they succeeded and did not fall into the learned helplessness trap. Then, do what they tell you. Again, can it hurt to mimic success?

Understanding and becoming conscious of how we think is a key to changing that learned helplessness into learned helpfulness. Consider these suggestions the next time you start beating up on yourself.