Inherited hypohedonia leads to learned helplessness: A conjecture updated.

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The reformulated learned helplessness theory posits depressogenic explanatory style (DES) as a vulnerability factor in depression. Early-life adversity has been suggested as the source of DES, but this is contradicted by empirically established features of the learned helplessness phenomenon itself and by the evidence for human resilience in the face of adversity. This article extends a conjecture first advanced by P. E. Meehl (1975) and argues that an inherited defect in hedonic capacity would be sufficient to produce DES by causing intermittent schedules of reinforcement to be experienced as extinction schedules, resulting in a pervasive and unremitting sense of helplessness. This proposed hedonic defect also provides a means for integrating the original and reformulated versions of learned helplessness theory and for integrating learned helplessness with emerging research and theory on the biology of vulnerability to depression.