The the Effects of Learned Helplessness on Processing of a Persuasive Message YAIR AMICHAI-HAMBURGER, MARIO MIKULINCER, AND NIR ZALTS Bar-llan University The current study examines the effects of exposure to unsolvable problems on the processing of a persuasive message. Participants exposed to either unsolvable failure or no-feedback tasks were presented with one of four versions of an advertisement about a hair shampoo and rated their attitude towards this product. Two aspects of the message were manipulated: the quality of arguments (strong, weak) and the attrac- tiveness of the communicator (attractive, non-attractive). In addition, participants rated their anxiety and the frequency of off-task thoughts during the experiment. Attitude towards the target product of participants in the failure condition was less affected by the argument's quality and more influenced by communicator attractive- ness than the attitude of participants in the no-feedback condition. Participants ex- posed to failures reported more anxiety and task-related worries than those exposed to no-feedback, and these ratings were found to mediate the effects of failure on the processing of a persuasive message. Results were discussed in terms of Learned Help- lessness theories and the Elaboration Likelihood Model. S tudies of learned helplessness (LH) in humans have shown that exposure to recurrent unsolvable problems can undermine performance on a subsequent test task (see Mikulincer, 1994, for a review). In terms of the original Learned Helplessness theory (Seligman, 1975), these deficits result from a reduction in a person's expectancy of control. Upon recurrent failure to solve a problem, people may develop the expectation that outcomes are uncontrollable and may transfer this expectation to a subsequent test task. As a result, they may put less effort into this task and consequently show performance deficits. Research has consistently shown that people who attribute failure to internal/ stable/global causes perform worse in a new task than people who make an external/ unstable/specific attribution (e.g., Mikulincer, 1986, 1988a, 1988b). Advances in theory and research have produced evidence that suggests a person's perception of control is not affected by unsolvable problems (e.g., Ford & Neale, 1985). Moreover, some studies found performance deficits following unsolvable problems with- out the mediation of this expectation (Kuhl, 1981; Mikulincer, 1989). These findings have informed the formulation of alternative theories that better ac- count for the effects of unsolvable problems. One of these theories emphasizes the role of task-irrelevant cognitions (Kuhl, 1981; Mikulincer, 1989). According to this theory, exposure to unsolvable problems may strengthen a person's tendency to engage in cog- nitive activities focused on his/her current negative emotional state (state-oriented cog- nitions). This cognitive focus is hypothesized to divert attention from task-relevant Current Psychology: Developmental, Learning, Personality, Social. Spring2003, Vol.22, No. 1, pp. 37- 46.