Correlation between Learned Helplessness and Academic Success

Abstract

This paper studies the available literature on learned helplessness, the factors that contribute to this state and its impact on students. This paper is a study to determine that if there is a Correlation between Learned Helplessness and Academic Success (specifically in relation to children who were placed in lower-level reading groups). The paper is a quantitative study that has been done by the researcher in order to find out whether correlation exists or not.

Table of contents

Literature Review4

Method9

Participants9

Instruments9

Procedures9

Survey Questionnaire10

Design and Application of Questionnaires11

Questionnaire Responses11

Reliability and Validity12

Results13

Analysis of Grammatical test13

Interview Analysis15

Learned Helplessness and Academic Success15

Motivation towards learning16

References18

Correlation between Learned Helplessness and Academic Success

Literature Review

Learned helplessness is a condition in human psychology whereby a person learns to behave in a helpless manner even when the person can help himself by avoiding the unpleasant situations. It is the change in the level of motivation, learning and affect in a person which leads to uncontrollable results or results that are essentially non-contingent (Fincham, 1989).

When people are faced with events that they perceive to be uncontrollable and negative, there is a tendency to develop symptoms of learned helplessness that can lead to depressive episodes. People perceive an event as uncontrollable when they are exposed to a situation in which they believe none of the actions available to them will lead to the desired outcome, such as repeated failure. From such a situation, people may learn that they are unable to control the outcome (Reyes et.al, 2008).

Symptoms of learned helplessness include deficits in motivation, cognition, and emotional coping. The motivational deficit is characterized by a reduction in initiation of voluntary actions to attempt to solve the problem. The cognitive deficit is characterized by a slowing in one's ability to learn. The emotional deficit is characterized by a depressed mood. When each of these deficits is present they can, depending upon their severity, generalizability, and duration, increase the likelihood of depression (Sue et.al, 2012).

The severity of these deficits in people has been linked to four main cognitive dimensions, three of which are linked to the causal attribution of the negative event. First, whether the person believes the cause of the negative event will apply generally to many areas of life (global attribution) or only in a specific area (specific attribution) affects the generalization of the helplessness deficits. Second, whether the person believes the cause will be long-enduring (stable attribution) or short-lived (unstable attribution) affects the longevity of the deficits. Third, whether the person believes the outcome is uncontrollable to all relevant people (external attribution) or only to themselves (internal attribution) affects how strongly one's self-esteem will be affected. Finally, the importance of the uncontrollable outcome affects the overall impact of all three deficits (Seel, 2011).

How a person ranks on these three attributional dimensions is known as their attributional style. To develop depressogenic symptoms from the learned helplessness deficits resulting from negative life events, a person must believe that the cause of the uncontrollable negative event will be widespread, long lasting, and primarily ...