The change and maintenance effectiveness of persistence training regarding the treatment of laboratory-induced and naturally occurring depression

Abstract

A study was conducted to evaluate the therapeutic effectiveness of persistence training as a model for treating depression. Subjects were female college students who were exposed to experimental manipulations to induce learned helplessness or who reached multiple-depression criteria on the MMPI and Beck Depression Inventory. Helpless and depressed subjects were treated with either response-contingent continuous reinforcement or partial reinforcement (persistence training) on a human shuttle apparatus. Following therapy, all subjects encountered recurring failure during an extinction phase. The findings showed that continuous and partial reinforcement schedules were equally effective in therapy, resulting in improved performances for both helpless and depressed subjects. There was evidence, however, that the treatment gains were less for depressed subjects than for helpless subjects, regardless of the type of therapy schedule used. With respect to maintenance of change, it was found that both helpless and depressed subjects persisted longer in the face of successive nonreinforcements (extinction) following partial reinforcement therapy as opposed to continuous reinforcement therapy. Further, there was evidence that depressed subjects persisted less in extinction than did helpless subjects, but only when therapy had occurred under conditions of continuous reinforcement. © 1980, The Psychonomic Society, Inc.. All rights reserved.