Trying and Giving Up

Abstract

In my 1982 book, Expectations and Actions (Feather, 1982b), Janoff-Bulman and Brickman (1982) discussed the question of what people learn from failure and how their behavior in failure situations can be maladaptive. They described two kinds of maladaptive response: excessive trying or persistence when expectations are high and repeated failure is experienced, and giving up too quickly in the face of failure when expectations are low. My intention in the present chapter is first to summarize the main points of their discussion and to describe subsequent research that was suggested by their analysis. I then review a sample of theoretical approaches that relate to the analysis of persistence and that have implications for the general question of when persistence or lack of persistence is self-defeating or maladaptive.