They called it "learned disability"; They tend to show weakness and gloom when people are faced with a difficult and uncontrollable situation.
Disability without hope
The spread of weakness and depression increased among people, especially after the Corona virus pandemic, which upended the lives of millions. While understanding the nature of "learned vulnerability" helps explain many of the negative feelings we experience, it inspires people with recent positive insights about the possibility of being resilient in the face of uncontrollable adversity; So the key is to be hopeful.
University of Pennsylvania graduate students Martin Seligman and Steven Maier discovered the phenomenon of "learned vulnerability" in the 1960s, while studying under experimental psychologist Richard Solomon. (Richard Solomon).
Animal experiment
Richard Solomon researched how dogs learn and respond to fear. His team chained each dog to a solitary cage with two compartments, and the dogs were given mild electric shocks in one of the compartments, which were coupled with an audible sound clip. Later, the dogs were untied, the audio clip was played back, and they were given the same mild electric shocks.
After the dogs learned the behavior of associating sound with pain, psychologist Richard Solomon expected the dogs to jump into the safe compartment to avoid pain. But he was surprised by her negative reaction. She remained in her place after hearing the audio clip and did not move a finger to escape from the pain.
This test was doomed by the criteria of classical adaptation or “Pavlovian conditioning” to failure. But psychologists Martin Seligman and Steve Meyer came to a different conclusion: The dogs' negative reaction was a very important outcome.
During the previous part of the experiment, when the dogs were tied up and subjected to a shock, it was observed that they complained, barked, and tried to escape at first, but all their efforts were in vain because of the restrictions. So Martin Seligman and Steve Meyer think the dogs understood this and decided to change their behaviour.
Experiment result
As a result, she acted helplessly the next time she was in a similar situation, with circumstances changing and the possibility of jumping freely if she wanted; Hoping that surrender is the way out of trauma.
Martin Seligman and Steve Meyer tested their theory. They arranged three groups of dogs for the initial testing phase. The first group was restrained as in the previous example while receiving tone-associated shocks, the second group was given the option to press the button to exit the safe room, and the third group received no shocks at all.
All dogs were released and the same audio clip was then played; The dogs' reaction varied; The dogs in the second group behaved predictably and tried to run quickly to the safety of the room. The dogs of the third group also learned from their peers the necessity of moving quickly to the safe room, while the dogs of the first group, who had been previously restrained, remained in place.
The important findings of Martin Seligman and Steve Meyer on "learned vulnerability" were published in the journal Experimental Psychology in 1967.
The most important element of any experience is its reflection on people and their psychology towards it.
Scientists between disability and hope
Scientist Martin Seligman and his colleagues replicated the results of the "learned vulnerability" experiment over the next decade, first with rodents and then with humans. As expected, a sample of volunteers showed rapid surrender, helplessness to uncontrollable events such as loud, annoying sounds and impossible tests.
By chance, they showed symptoms very similar to depression, such as a loss of meaning, sadness, and a loss of passion and interest. This led the world to the conclusion that acquired weakness is a form of depression.
As long as the re-examination of these studies showed many surprises, when a group of scientists re-experiment under the pressure of another set of events that can not be controlled. Scientists have noticed that some people do not give up trying to control the situation, knowing that there is no point in controlling disturbing events and improving the situation.
Others who gave up and felt weak for a while got up quickly and started acting freely in the later parts of the trials. The question here is: why? Why did uncontrollable adversity render some people helpless, while others showed greater resilience?
The answer to the question
Two researchers worked to find an answer to this question, one of them was a graduate student who was a student of the scientist "Martin Seligman", "Lyn Abramson", and the other researcher was the psychiatrist at the University of Oxford "John Teasdale".
John Tisdale and Lynn Abramson indicated that feeling weak is not a strong driver of depression, contrary to what was stated in the results of the previous study. What matters most is how people interpret their feelings of vulnerability, and what characteristics and traits are associated with them.
Do they blame themselves, or do they blame those responsible for conducting the experiment? And do they generalize their helplessness to all life, or limit it to laboratory experiments? The way people interpreted their experience of helplessness was the most important element in applying the theory.
How do people explain disability and hope?
Scientist Martin Seligman collaborated with Lynn Abramson and John Tisdale and found that there are three ways people explain what happens to them: This is based on generalizing characteristics of vulnerability. The first method relates to continuity.
Learned weakness may be a permanent quality, such as saying, “I will always be powerless and will not do anything of value,” or a temporary quality, such as saying, “I was unable to get over the situation successfully, but my efforts will pay off in other situations.”
The second method relies on the comprehensiveness of weakness, as it is either specific to a situation such as their saying: “I am only helpless in this test,” or it is comprehensive; That is, generalized to all problems. As for the third method, it depends on the source of weakness, so it is either internal, as they say: “It is my fault,” or external, as they say: “It is the fault of the world or someone else.”
As Martin Seligman later said of the findings, people differ in their reactions and have "a different explanatory style." Some have a "pessimistic exegetical style"; They generalize the negative characteristics of their life events, whether they are internal, general, or permanent, and are thus more likely to be depressed.
Others adopt "optimistic explanatory styles" who don't blame themselves when bad things happen; Rather, they place the blame on the world, and believe that adversity is temporary, finite, and specific. Their words are characterized by optimism when talking about the world and their place in it, and they are more flexible than others.
Later, Lynn Abramson and her colleagues called the learned depressive vulnerability theory the "vulnerability-induced depression theory." Vulnerable depression appears when people experience negative events in their lives, such as losing a job, and come to pessimistic conclusions about the causes and consequences of the event, and its repercussions on their self-image.
They may think that they are unable to change their circumstances, that they will never find work, and that they are worthless as a result, which are thoughts that weaken and demoralize them.
Researches and studies
Research over the years has confirmed the connection between feeling vulnerable and mental illness. Aaron Beck, the founder of cognitive behavioral therapy, identified hopelessness as one of the main causes of suicide. Conversely, feeling optimistic contributes to improving general mental and physical health.
For example, people being more hopeful and optimistic will enhance their ability to tolerate pain for longer periods. Optimists reported higher levels of safety and psychological stability after experiencing the death of a loved one. The ability of sanguine people to think creatively and resilience to overcome adversity is also shown. This helped them look on the bright side of life.
Optimistic people also perform better academically, and are less likely to feel lonely or succumb to hopelessness and vulnerability when life gets the better of them.
All of the aforementioned evidence points to the necessity of having a strong future vision, along with striving to instill or regain a sense of optimism. This is because it is the gateway to resilience and alleviation of emotional suffering. Here the following question arises: how to be optimistic, especially in difficult times?
Research by Martin Seligman and Lynn Abramson suggests that changing our perspective on adversity can help instill hope. Instead of blaming yourself for losing a job or feeling helpless, you can blame the coronavirus pandemic.
Instead of focusing on the things that are out of control, like the emergence of new strains of the coronavirus, and then finding that life is chaotic and unpredictable, you can focus on the guaranteed things that can be controlled, such as your routine, habits and the way you treat others. You can remind yourself that, like any hard time, these adversities are temporary and will pass at some point.
You can also instill optimism by reconsidering its ordinary meaning. You might think of hope as a form of wishful thinking, the positive and perhaps naive expectation that everything will be fine.
Hope theory
But according to the "hope theory", developed by the late American psychologist Charles Snyder, hope for better conditions is not blind optimism; Rather, it is the product of goals that chart one’s future, a sense of responsibility towards the course of his life, in addition to “directing energy to achieve goals,” with a firm belief in the achievability of goals, and drawing “life paths with plans in which the road features are clear.”
In other words, people don't have to be hopeful and optimistic for no reason; Rather, it is natural that they seek to control their lives and develop a sense of responsibility in their endeavors, and this expels the feeling of weakness.
Drawing on the research of the scientist "Charles Snyder", psychologists have developed various activities to spread hope. Therapists who practice Hope Therapy help their clients clearly envision their future goals, chart realistic paths to achieving those goals, and reframe obstacles as challenges to overcome.
Instead of focusing on clients' past failures, the therapist focuses on their successes, which will fuel their endeavors towards success in achieving their future goals.
Some activities were tested in one study to provide collective hope over eight sessions. During which the participants reported the acquisition of optimism building skills, a sense of deep life meanings, in addition to the development of rational thinking and self-esteem, and most importantly, the decrease in levels of anxiety and depression after treatment, compared to another control group.
Optimism and hope
Optimism, as accurately understood by the late scientist Charles Snyder, will make a positive difference even in the darkest of circumstances. Consider the results of research by physicist and ethicist Chris Feudtner at the Justin Michael Ingerman Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
In his work with parents of children suffering from life-threatening illnesses, he observed the ability of optimistic parents to cope with the difficult reality of their children's serious illness. With everyone desperately wanting their children to recover, he noted in one of his studies that more optimistic parents were more likely to limit medical interventions if their children's condition deteriorated. This suggests that having hope allowed them to abandon an impossible goal and embrace another goal of alleviating suffering.
Besides, scientist Chris Wiedner has found that asking about parents' expectations and hopes helps give them hope. He experimented with giving bad news about the futility of treatment or the worsening of their son's illness, and then asked them about their wish: "Given the adverse circumstances at hand, what do you wish for now?" Parents initially hoped for miracles of healing for their children, or for waking up from a bad dream. But then, when Astada gently asked for answers, their subsequent responses became more concrete.
Hope capacity
He recounted this experience in his article 'The Breadth of Hopes': "Further answers tend to differ from the previous ones, being more oriented towards pain or suffering and the hope of finding relief, to the longing for home and the hope of returning to it, or at least Survival not in the material sense but in the spiritual sense, and the hope of finding meaning and understanding what they are experiencing.”
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