Deprivation Influences Learned Helplessness Behavior Summary

In 1967, Martin Seligman created a study along with his fellow colleagues on classical conditioning. Seligman desired to understand the idea of association. In the experiment, Seligman accidentally came across an interesting fact. The study included Seligman ringing a bell, then giving a light shock to dogs. After multiple times of doing this, the dogs reacted as if they have been shocked simply from hearing the sound of the bell. Then Seligman proceeded to put the dogs into large, individual crates. Each crate had a low divider through which the dogs were able to see and jump over to the other side. The dogs were put on the electric side of the fence; he then gave the dogs a light shock. Interestingly, the dogs laid there helpless, and didn’t even attempt to jump over the fence and reach the non electric side. It seemed as though the dogs felt that after enduring what they did in the first part of the experiment, there’s no point in even trying to help themselves escape the electric
The study consisted of a sample of 104 Indian students ranging from ages fifteen through eighteen. The independent variable in this study is the amount of deprivation experienced by the females who are suspected to be more deprived, while men are suspected to be less. The materials include the anagrams and other puzzles given to the subjects by the experimenter. It is called the independent variable because these variables cause the reaction, the dependent variables. The dependent variable includes the amount of learned helplessness experienced after trying to solve the tasks given. The purpose of the study was to determine whether or not there is a correlation between deprived subjects being more likely to exhibit learned helplessness behavior more than the non-deprived or privileged subjects. The study is therefore, a correlational