Psychology 2035A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Learned Helplessness, Explanatory Style

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2035A/B
• Professor: Alvin Segal

Document Summary

Meaning-focused : lose my possession in a fire reminds me of what is truly important in life. Proactive : i am going to make sure before i bring up the issues. Common coping patterns of limited value: analyze the adaptive value of giving up as a response to stress. Giving up (behavioral disengagement) learned helplessness : passive behavior produced by exposure to unavoidable aversive events. Sometimes, it is then transferred to situations in which the person is not really helpless, passively accept the setbacks that they could have overcome. This then creates a passive reaction to stressful events, rather than active problem-solving. Cognitive interpretation of aversive events may determine whether develop learned helpless or not. People with a pessimistic explanatory style view aversive events as out of their control feel helpless and give up. This coping strategy is associated with increased distress.