What Is The Locus Of Control In Psychology?
The locus of control (LC) is a term widely used in the field of psychology, especially in recent years. It is used to refer to the perception that a person has about the causes of what happens in his life; that is, to what extent is it considered responsible for the origin of the behavior, is it external or internal?
In this sense, the locus of control is in connection with the psychological implications of the point of view that a person adopts and with their way of interacting with the environment. Next we will take a tour of the main characteristics of this concept.
The locus of control
Rotter, in 1966, proposed the concept of locus of control (named with the Latin word for ‘place of control’ ) as a personality trait in his theory of social learning. Although it is thought that other authors already referred to the LC, less explicitly, some years ago.
Thus, Rotter defined it in 1966 as follows: ” If the person perceives that the event is contingent on his behavior or his own relatively permanent characteristics, it has been said that it is a belief in internal control .”
Instead, the author also stated that “ when a reinforcement is perceived as following some personal action, but not being entirely contingent on it, it is typically perceived, in our culture, as the result of luck (…), and in this sense It has been said that it is a belief in external control ”. (Visdomine-Lozano and Luciano, 2006).
As we can see, Rotter established a clear difference between internal control and external control. Thus, when the person attributes what happens externally to their behavior and perceives that they have control over the external consequences, they would have an internal locus of control. On the other hand, if he believes that what happened is due to luck, chance or fate, that is, that what happened is independent of his behavior, he would manifest an external locus of control.
Therefore, this concept is quite important, since if a person believes that what happens around him does not depend on him, it is difficult to act to change it. Thus, a kind of paralysis occurs that prevents people from acting or achieving the proposed objective or goal.
What is the difference between internal LC and external LC?
How can we improve our locus of control?
Practicing mindfulness or mindfulness provides clairvoyance when dealing with situations that arise on a day-to-day basis. In fact, there are studies (such as the one carried out by Hamarta, E. et al. In 2013, published in the International Journal of Academic Research) that demonstrate the efficacy of these approaches and in which this technique is referred to as a predictor. from l.
Thus, the practice of daily mindfulness for 20 minutes can bring positive benefits to various aspects of our daily lives; among them, it collaborates to facilitate the disposition towards a suitable LC for each one of the diverse situations that are presented to us.
