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> Through experiments that involved shocking dogs in different ways, Seligman developed the extremely important psychological concept of learned helplessness. I
by 0xcde4c3db 5y ago
> Through experiments that involved shocking dogs in different ways, Seligman developed the extremely important psychological concept of learned helplessness. It refers to a situation in which an organism’s lack of control over its surroundings prompts it to stop engaging in standard acts of self-preservation.
Note that neuroscience has marched on since then, and the original model explained here essentially got it backward, but people still tend to cite it as though it's authoritative. Later research suggests that passivity is the default, and exposure to prolonged aversive stimuli inhibits the process of learning to take action [1]. Seligman subsequently shifted his focus to "learned optimism" (hence the book title).
[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27337390/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27337390/
- refulgentis 5y agoI was depressed when I invoked this to describe what it felt like on a team I just joined, and then the manager began repeating it to everyone, and I found out it was the core reason why psychologists had assessed the CIA black sites as unhelpful, the psychologists who designed and okay'd them were under the impression learned helplnessness was still a viable psychological model. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness#Emergence_under_torture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness#Emergence... The older I get, the more I understand part of the reason its awful being old is you get to see society make grand mistakes, over and over