Twenty-eight elementary learning disabled children viewed as learned helpless were randomly assigned to one of four treatment conditions, by virtue of their score on the Intellectual Achievement Responsibility Scale. The students were administered pre-assessment and post-assessment trials of the Intellectual Achievement Responsibility Scale, Peabody Individual Achievement Test - Mathematics subtest, and the length of time expended on unsolvable block design tasks (first and last days of training).

This study investigated the effects of altering attributions for failure so that learned helpless students would learn to respond to tasks more effectively. Procedures involving reinforcement and attribution retraining were assessed in terms of their effectiveness in developing persistence on difficult tasks, internalization of personal responsibility, and improved academic achievement in mathematics.

The results indicated that learned helpless learning disabled children who received attribution retraining become more persistent on unsolvable tasks than did those students who received no attribution retraining. Furthermore, significant effects were observed for time on task, internalization of personal responsibility and performance on the mathematics subtests, over trials. The results indicated that learned helpless learning disabled children can be taught to become more persistent on tasks.

It was hypothesized that a procedure that taught the learned helpless learning disabled children to take responsibility for their behavior would cause them to invest more effort on tasks, thus leading to a change in performance. This should lead to increased persistence, or increased motivation toward a task. Subsequently, increased persistence should help to establish a dependent relationship between one's performance and reinforcement. Such a bond should lead to an increase in internalization or responsibility (internal locus of control).