There is considerable debate regarding the effects of childhood sexual abuse on an individual's subsequent adjustment. To determine which variables are most useful in predicting subsequent adjustment of individuals who were involved in sexual experiences as children or adolescents, 59 female and 17 male undergraduates who reported having had a…

Learned helplessness is a variable which has commonly been considered in research on sex-related differences in mathematics achievement. In this study, learned helplessness has been defined in terms of a debilitating or facilitating response resulting from failure on mathematical word problems. The construct has been called Performance Following…

Explored the relation between childhood sexual victimization experience and adult functioning. Victimized women differed from nonvictims on: (a) childhood family and social experiences; (b) adult attributional style; and (c) level of depression, psychological distress, self-esteem, and sexual problems. Suggests that the sexually victimized women's…

Two experiments investigated the relationship between the magnitude of motivation for control over the environment and tendency to derogate victims. Manipulated situational controllability and uncontrollability within a learned helplessness procedure and assessed derogation of a victimized stranger. Results indicated that motivation and need for…

Twenty-eight learned helpless children (ages 9-13) assessed as reading below grade level were randomly assigned to one of four reinforcement and attribution retaining treatments. Indirect and direct attribution retaining increased childrens' reading persistence and their attribution of failure on the Intellectual Achievement Responsibility scale…

Investigates the effects of a helplessness experience on the subsequent performance of deaf adolescents functioning at mildly underachieving or severely underachieving levels. Results indicate high post-test error scores among severely underachieving deaf adolescents experiencing an unsolvable pretreatment situation. Recommendations offer…

Study looked to determine the strength of the relationship between smoking, depression, intention to smoke, and several psychosocial and environmental factors. Participants completed the Multiscore Depression Inventory (MDI) and items regarding smoking behavior. Analyses found that participants were more likely to smoke if parents smoked, if…

Assessed helplessness behaviors in five- to seven-year-old children of mothers with and without depression. Found that, although mothers with depression set a more negative affective tone than mothers without depression during mother-child puzzle tasks, there were few significant differences between the two groups of mothers and children. (MDM)

Examined the hypothesis that processes other than those related to concepts about ability produce helplessness in children younger than 10. Found that eight year olds did not experience helplessness in response to feedback about their failure in an achievement task but did experience helplessness when they failed to perform a physical task. (MM)

This study examined the response of intermediate-grade boys (N=18) and girls (N=20) with (N=20) or without (N=18) learning disabilities (LD) to experimental dyadic interactions, either friendly or unfriendly. Children with LD were hypersensitive to both situations and girls with LD appeared most negatively affected by the unfriendly interaction.…

Explored the Korean concepts of emotion "dapdaphada" and "uulhada," somewhat equivalent to helplessness and depression, respectively. Results with 50 Korean and 50 German undergraduates indicate that these terms are specific emotion words in the domain of sadness with no translation equivalent in German. (SLD)

Finds that teaching 13-year-old poor readers to use effective reading strategies convinced them that reading successes and failures were attributable to use of effective or ineffective strategies; improved their comprehension performance and increased use of reading strategies; and reduced their perceptions of learned helplessness. (RS)

Individual differences in same-aged children's reasoning about effort and ability, as well as the consequences of different forms of reasoning in actual achievement situations, were investigated. It was hypothesized that different forms of children's reasoning would be related to different (helpless versus mastery-oriented) motivational patterns.…

The effects of contingency training, instructor expressiveness, and student incentives on student achievement and attributions were investigated in a simulated college classroom. The following conditions were involved: a contingency manipulation resembling an aptitude test; an instructor lecture; two levels of student incentive; and an achievement…

An exploratory study investigated the relationship between loneliness, coping strategies, and cognitive styles in a sample of 52 gifted students from rural Nebraska (mean age 17.25 years). Assessment measures consisted of the Woodward Loneliness Inventory, the Kalyan-Masih Coping Inventory I, and the Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT), which…