Abstract
M.A. (Clinical Psychology)
This study was undertaken in an attempt to validate the
hypothesis that anxious subjects who ingested diazepam
(Valium) and were subjected to a helplessness inducing
situation,would become more depressed and more hopeless
than people who were subjected to the same situation and
obtained anxiety relief by means of a response-contingent
behaviour - a muscle relaxation exercise.
Twenty-nine male and female students were selected from
the undergraduate and post-graduate student population
at the Rand Afrikaans University on the basis of scores
on the IPAT Anxiety Scale and the Beck Depression Inventory.
The subjects were randomly assigned to one of the three
experimental groups and the one control group and were
subjected to the helplessness inducing situation. A
wide spectrum of measures were performed and
the results subjected to analyses of variance. The
results indicated support for the hypothesis that people
who received response contingent anxiety relief became less
depressed than people who obtained non-response-contingent
anxiety relief. No support was found for the hopelessness
construct. The lack of results of this were discussed
in terms of the effectiveness of the measuring
instruments and that hopelessness and helplessness might
be different concepts.