Locus of control

• Locus of Control - a person’s perception of personal control over their own behaviour. This is measured along a continuum of “high internal” to “low internal”.
• Locus of Control example: I have failed my exam

  High LOC - I should have studied more. I didn’t put in enough effort

  Low LOC - I had a bad teacher. I was disturbed during my revision.
• LOC. High internals are active seekers of information that is useful to them, so they rely less on the opinions of others. They can resist coercion.
• LOC Evaluation. Twenge etal found Americans are becoming more external. However Twenge also found out that people are becoming more resistant to obedience. This challenges the link between LOC and obedience.
• LOC Evaluation. Avtgis carried out meta analysis, he found that individuals that scored highly for external LOC tend to be more easily persuaded, influenced and more conforming. This adds validity to the LOC explanation.