A study was conducted to examine the task-related help-seeking behavior of 85 third- and fifth-grade boys and girls of varying scholastic ability. Participants, white middle-class children, were blocked into high- and low-ability groups on the basis of word comprehension subscores on the California Achievement Test. Children were presented with 16 words whose meanings had to be identified by selecting from a list of alternatives the word most closely matching the target word in meaning. Children were given the opportunity to seek help as desired, and their bids for help were classified as being either necessary or unnecessary. Children's preference for indirect versus direct help was also assessed. Results of the study indicated that, with increased age, children seek more necessary help than unnecessary help and clearly prefer mastery-oriented help to dependency-oriented help, especially at low ability levels. Implications of the findings for understanding individual differences in the adaptive use of help seeking in achievement situations were drawn. (Author/RH)