Jm. Chaney et al., An experimental examination of learned helplessness in older adolescents and young adults with long-standing asthma, J PED PSYCH, 24(3), 1999, pp. 259-270
Objective: To examine the effects of experimentally induced learned helples
sness in older adolescents and young adults with long-standing asthma.
Methods: Thirty-nine participants (18-24 years of age) with histories of lo
ng-standing asthma (AS) and an age-matched healthy cohort (HC) (N = 94) rec
eived either contingent or noncontingent feedback on an experimental task.
Participants' anagram-solving performance was assessed following the experi
mental procedure. Participants also completed a measure of depression and p
retest-posttest measures of mood, expectancy, and attributions related to e
xperimental task performance.
Results: The AS participants demonstrated significantly greater problem-sol
ving deficits following response-noncontingent feedback, compared to the HC
group. Further, whereas both AS and HC participants made more internal per
formance attributions when given response-contingent feedback, only AS part
icipants demonstrated a pattern of increased internal attributions (i.e., s
elf-focus) following response-noncontingent failure. In addition, 21% of AS
participants met DSM-IV criteria for major depression, compared to only 5%
of the HC group.
Conclusions: Individuals with long-standing asthma may be at increased risk
for depression and for learned helplessness deficits, specifically impaire
d problem solving, in response to environmental noncontingency. Results are
discussed in terms of both learned helplessness theory and perseverative s
elf-focus conceptualizations of depression. The implications for both short
- and long-term management of pediatric asthma are also discussed.