Aerobic exercise and chocolate as means for reducing learned helplessness

Abstract

This study tested the effects of 10 min of aerobic exercise, a chocolate snack, or guided imagery as a means of reducing the learned helplessness effects due to the experience of an unsolvable task. It was hypothesized that exposure to unsolvable tasks would lead to a higher level of anxiety, engagement in more task-irrelevant cognitions, and a poorer performance on a solvable test task. Intervention with either chocolate, 10 min of aerobic exercises, or guided imagery would reduce anxiety, reduce task irrelevant cognitions, and prevent performance decrement. Five groups of subjects (n = 100) were tested on a visual search task after experiencing an unsolvable task. Results indicated that the experience of the unsolvable task led to a higher level of anxiety arousal compared to a group that did not experience the unsolvable task. The intervention of either aerobic exercise, chocolate, or guided imagery led to a reduction in anxiety to the level of the control group that had not experienced an unsolvable task. Task-irrelevant cognitions were found to be higher in the classic nonintervention learned helplessness group and in the guided imagery group. The only group to suffer a performance decrement on the test task was the classic learned helplessness group without intervention. All three interventions were found to be equally effective in preventing performance decrement. Results are discussed in terms of an irrelevant defensive cognition/anxiety model as well as in terms of a controllability model.