members of lower class minority communities (especially those with distinctive skin color like Blacks and many Hispanics) often feel that their social mobility may be blocked primarily by factors beyond their control. If the minority group is politically powerless and economically disadvantaged, learned helplessness (a low sense of personal control over one's destiny, low expectations for success, maladaptive causal attributions for success and failures) among the children can further limit school achievement (see Brody, 1968; Dweck, 1975; Harari and Covington, 1981; Louden, 1978; Nicholls, 1979).