Jennifer's Theory Of Learned Helplessness

The theory of learned helplessness and the attribution-helplessness explain Jennifer’s symptoms. The theory of learned helplessness is when a person gets depressed because they lost control over their reinforcements and felt responsible for feeling helpless. In comparison to the behavior model, the cognitive model explains how a person accepts their fate and believes they are “generally hopeless” ( Comer 201). Throughout Jennifer’s entire life, she has endured the lack of attention and reinforcements from her parents and her first boyfriend, Jeremy. When she met Mark, he gave her what always lacked in her life. Soon, however, Mark began being consumed with work and not providing her with the same amount of attention and reinforcements. Jennifer’s downward spiral to depression is expected because no matter who she is with, she always ends up with the same treatment. At this point she has learned the feeling of helplessness. The attribution helplessness theory is “ when people view events as beyond their …show more content…
A kind of socio-cultural model is called family-social perspective. The family-social perspective is similar to behavioral model because social rewards is also important. As stated in the book, depression is tied to the lack of social support is found in family. If a person is not given social support they will be depressed longer. This is similar to Jennifer's case because she was not given social support in her high school years. She in fact felt that her boyfriend, Jeremy was her only source of support. When Jennifer went to college And avoided making friends or dating, she began feeling lonely and isolated from her friends and family. This isolation could also lead to depression. Interpersonal psychotherapy change is how depressed people deal with close relationships in their life. Interpersonal psychotherapy can help treat Jennifer