Helplessness and control of childhood events in depressed and normal women

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Abstract
Sixty hospitalized depressed women and 35 women students of comparable age completed the Zung Self‐Rating Depression Scale, the Adult Nowicki‐Strickland 1‐E Scale, the Hopelessness Scale by Beck et al., and a version of Coddington's Life Event Record, Preschool Age Group which included information on the affective tone and perceived control of childhood events. For controls, current internality was related to control of good childhood events while for the patients, externality, depression, and hopelessness were related to bad controlled childhood events. Patients reported greater control of childhood events than did controls, contrary to Seligman's (1975) suggestions regarding the long‐term antecedents of learned helplessness. The tendency of depressives to feel helpless in the present while assuming responsibility for the past is discussed in terms of the possibility that they attribute negative outcomes to stable internal factors and positive outcomes to chance.