Learned Helplessness

Revan Wong

2.4.17

Psychology 150-01

Learned Helplessness

        While looking through 25 of the most influential psychological experiments of history, I found one that really caught my attention. Conducted by one of the most enthusiastic psychologists within the scientific field for positive psychology, Martin Seligman performed and conducted the “Learned Helplessness Experiment”. The main idea of his experiment was to associate one thing with another on animals and/or humans and retrieve the results.

        In the experiment of Martin Seligman, it involved two major components, the ringing of a bell, and a small shock to a dog shortly after the bell was rung. After a number of tests, much like any human being, the dog reacted to the shock as if he had been shocked as soon as the bell was rung. The tests were done on multiple dogs over a period of time and were then placed into a large crate separated down the middle by a low fence that the dog could easily get over.  The side that the dog was placed on was electrified, but on the other side of the fence it was not. When the dog was placed on the electrified side, Seligman sent a light shock to the dog expecting the dog to jump over to the fence to the non electrified side. In a shocking result, the dog did not jump to the other side, or did not even move, but simply laid down. The results of this test were unexpected especially since the dog did not react to the shock. It was then hypothesized that as the dogs learned from the first test that there was nothing that they could do about the shock so just laid down instead. Proving that their hypothesis was correct, they brought in a new set of dogs and ran the same second part of the test and the dogs all jumped over the fence. The conclusion that was described is known as learned helplessness. It is basically when “a human or animal does not attempt to get out of a negative situation because the past has taught them that they are helpless.

        While reading this experiment, my first initial thoughts was how rude and cruel these experiments were to treat dogs and other animals like this, but while reading others, I learned that it was for science and in the end it was for a good purpose to figure out things that we now know. I also learned that things that affect us in everyday life that we feel helpless to can keep us down for a very long time until we decide to persevere through our fears.

        I could relate this to my own life in many ways, but one thing that I would like to relate this to is baseball. Since baseball is a game built around failure and defeat, it was a lot like the dog being shocked with nothing it could do about it. My favorite saying in baseball is “Baseball is a game of failure, its how you respond from it that makes you a better one.” So accepting failure like accepting a shock is one thing, you can't do much about it. But responding to it and trying to do something about it is another. And thats what I think that this experiment was all about and what it taught me.