Depression - Learned helplessness

"Learned helplessness" offered a model to explain human depression, in which apathy and submission prevail, causing the individual to rely fully on others for help. This can result when life circumstances cause the individual to experience life choices as irrelevant. Chemical dependence may also foster such a condition.

Environments in which people feel they have no control over what happens to them, such as prison, war, disability, famine and drought may tend to foster learned helplessness. An example involves concentration camp prisoners during the Holocaust, when some prisoners, called Mussulmen, refused to care or fend for themselves. Present-day examples can be found in state-run mental institutions, orphanages, or long-term care facilities.

Not all people become depressed as a result of being in a situation where they appear not to have control; in what Seligman called "explanatory style," people in a state of learned helplessness view problems as personal, pervasive, or permanent. That is,


 * Personal - They may see themselves as the problem; that is, they have internalized the problem.
 * Pervasive - They may see the problem affecting all aspects of life.
 * Permanent - They may see the problem as unchangeable.

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Papers

 * helplessness Google Scholar