Locus of Control

One intriguing individual difference concerns personal views that outcomes of interpersonal problems rely mostly on how conflict outcomes depend on one’s own ability and effort versus other people’s power or luck.

Research reveals that people who believe that productive outcomes of conflict emerge due to their interactive skills and efforts are more likely to work harder to achieve productive outcomes. People who do not believe that their ability and/or effort can affect conflict outcomes tend to engage in behaviors that fail to achieve productive outcomes. We refer to such self-confident orientations as locus of control. Under this umbrella term, we refer to related constructs (e.g., self-efficacy).

Locus of Control refers to the extent to which individuals believe that their engagement in particular behaviors will lead to rewarding outcomes (Rotter, 1966). Through social learning, people come to believe that their behaviors can yield different types of rewards (or punishments). They believe in conflict processes and their ability to hang in there. For personal control, they use tactics to their advantage. If people do believe that their behavior causes their own rewards and punishments, they adopt behaviors in concert with an internal locus-of-control. “Internals” believe that their successes and failures are due to their own motivations, abilities, and effort. To reiterate, internals hold faith in processes that allow them opportunities to achieve desired goals. One item, for example, in the Affiliation Locus of Control Scale reads: “It seems to me that getting along with people is a skill” (Lefcourt, Martin, Fick, & Saleh, 1985).

On the other hand, individuals with an external locus-of-control believe that their successes and failures are due to factors outside their control. “Externals” do not believe in their ability in personal control to manage interaction processes to achieve desired outcomes.

Accordingly, externals more readily give up on strategic conflict processes that can lead to success. Externals also consider that their own motivation for behavior depends on other people, chance, or fate (e.g., “My enjoyment of a social occasion is almost entirely dependent on the personalities of the other people who are there” [Lefcourt, 1979]).

Moreover, people’s control orientations vary along different domains ofbehav- ior. For instance, an individual could have an internal locus of control for making friends but an external locus of control for her own health outcomes. Research has been clear with regard to how one’s locus of control affects interpersonal influence and conflict behaviors (e.g., Barbuto & Moss, 2006; Booth-Butterfield, Anderson, & Booth-Butterfield, 2000; Canary, Cody, & Marston, 1986; Canary, Cunningham, & Cody, 1988; Caughlin & Vangelisti, 2000; Goodstadt & Hjelle, 1973; Lefcourt et al., 1985). This research reveals that people with an internal (vs. external) orientation:

• seek a wide range of goals;

• have confidence in their ability to succeed in obtaining goals;

• employ rational arguments and persuasion to influence outcomes;

• disclose what they want;

• engage in fewer demand—withdraw patterns;

• do not refer to a more powerful role relationship (e.g., as a supervisor);

• are persistent when attempting to influence others;

• resist other people’s influence;

• push back against other people’s pressure to comply with their wishes;

• do not perceive other people as obstructive;

• problem-solve with partners to plan for the future;

• avoid ingratiating other people;

• do not threaten other people.

These behaviors might appear as a long list. However, internals do not engage in all of them, only a few of them pop up in different studies. To show how a high locus of control looks in real life, consider the segment of conversation that follows on p. 98.

Note how the female begins the conflict saying she will make him a deal about cooking meals (turns 3.3—3.4).

Hers is not a genuine deal as it involves options based on her two goals, and neither are his to negotiate. It appears that her primary goal is for him to go to bible study on Thursday nights (turn 19.4). The woman clearly keeps on track of her goals, and she leverages how he does not want to cook against the fact that he does not want to go to bible study on his only free night. The husband, however, cannot persist, avoid compliance, or problem-solve to watch TV free of obligations on a Thursday. Also, he is out of control by reacting with a loud protest (turn 4.1), which he quickly abandons. She enjoys a high locus of control whereas he bears the burden of a low locus of control (although he does not have to):

Turn	Speaker	Message
1.1	F	Okay number one item.
2.1	M	You first.
3.1	F	Cooking meals;
3.2		Let’s just start with cooking meals.
3.3		Okay I’ll make you a deal.
3.4		I’ll make you a deal on cooking meals.
4.1	M	NO, I AM NOT GONNA STOP WATCHING baseball games just because...
5.1	F	I wasn’t going to say that. I wasn’t going to say that.
5.2		Do you want to solve the cooking meal problem or do we just want to fight about it?
6.1	M	No because...
7.1	F	Would you like me to make the meals?
7.2		Then I want something back.
7.3		That’s all, I’ll make you a deal.
8.1	M	No, I think you just do it because it’s your responsibility.
8.2		You’ve got kids to feed and stuff
9.1	F	Why do you say that kids to feed thing?
9.2		We have one kid, he’s a grown up.
9.3		He can cook for himself.
10.1	M	He is sixteen.
10.2		He cooks for himself all the time.
11.1	F	He doesn’t all the time.
11.2		Anyway, we are supposed to discuss our problem so I...
12.1	M	At least you could go grocery shopping.
13.1	F	I buy lots of ready to eat things that people don’t eat.
14.1	M	Like, what?
14.2		Like corn in a bag.
15.1	F	That is not true.
15.2		There is T.V. dinners in there. There’s pot pies. There’s burritos. There’s plenty of sandwich meat and stuff.
15.3		There’s lots of things that people if they take ten minutes they can make their own meal.
15.4		Nobody is starving here.
15.5		I think you just need to see me cook for some reason.
16.1	M	I just, it’s just that I grew up eating nice full healthy well-balanced meals.
17.1	F	You don’t need full meals anymore, Doug.
17.2		You need little bitty meals.
18.1	M	Don’t say my name. This is going to be broadcast on the internet (laughs).
19.1	F	You don’t need big meals, you need little meals.
19.2		You need to have salads for dinner, that’s it.
19.3		I’ll make a salad.
19.4		Here’s what I was going to say: I’ll cook a meal every night ifyou go to Thursday night bible study.
20.1	M	Thursday night now.
20.2		Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, now Thursday too?
21.1	F	Now it’s Thursday night bible study.

Some people have a distorted locus of control.

Some people believe their successes are due to internal characteristics, whereas their failures are due to external factors (Lefcourt, 1982). These people are known as “defensive internals.” Conversely, “defensive externals” believe that their failures are due to internal factors, whereas their successes are due to powerful others, chance, or luck. Moreover, too much internality can be unrealistic and can lead to interpersonal problems. For example, people might hold themselves responsible for all their relational troubles, do not see their partner’s role in conflicts and are vulnerable to the partner’s accusation tactics. Over time, the vulnerable person probably would adopt an extreme external locus of control and remain in the relationship through guilt. Or someone might adopt an extreme external locus of control whereby he or she sees only external factors as causes of all their behaviors—so they believe that positive and negative processes can, for example, be explained by fate, powers in control, chance, and so forth. Individuals need to adjust these behavioral distortions for greater personal control.

These findings lead to the following:

Conclusion 7.10: Internals believe that conflict outcomes result from their own ability and effort; externals do not believe in their ability to manage conflict.

Conclusion 7.11: Internals tend to use strategic conflict, because they rely on many different tactics to achieve their goals.

Conclusion 7.12: Distortions in locus of control can occur, such that people overestimate their own influence to bring about outcomes, including conflict outcomes; or they underestimate their influence to bring about outcomes, including conflict outcomes.

Suggestion: 7.10: Be mindful that you can have a very strong influence on the processes and outcomes of conflict.

Suggestion 7.11: To gain personal control, use strategic conflict behaviors that reflect an internal locus of control: seek a wide range of goals; have confidence in your ability to use communication processes for desired outcomes; use problemsolving and rational arguments to negotiate goals; disclose what you want; persist when influencing others; avoid ingratiating other people; and do not threaten other people.

Suggestion 7.12: Adjust your thinking to compensate for distortions in your locus of control, and look again at Suggestion 7.11.

BOX 7.2 STUDENT STORY

Bathroom panties and throwing trash on her bed by

Tawnie Fisher

Recently, I moved into an apartment with three girls. Kerry was one of my best friends and I know the other two girls, Abby and Jolene, through her. Abby and Kim shared a bathroom, and Jolene and I shared the other. In the beginning of the year, the apartment remained clean, and we shared groceries, etc....

I quickly learned that Jolene was a slob. Since I am a neat freak, I tried many times to ask her politely to pick up her things that were in the common areas of the apartment. Most of the time she would, but with an attitude. The final straw for me was when I went to Texas with the ISU cheerleading team to cheer on the Cyclones.

I came back to find our bathroom in a disgusting state. Jolene had not only left her dirty panties on the floor but also left her used feminine hygiene products not only in the trash but also on the floor of the bathroom. As one can imagine, I was livid. I didn't have time to speak with her about the matter so I left her a note asking her to clean it up. When I got home from classes later that evening I found that she had picked up the bathroom. I was pleased that the matter did not have to go any further. I couldn't have been more wrong!

When I went into my bedroom I found that she had put the trash bin from the bathroom in the middle of my bedroom floor. I couldn't believe it and I really didn't know what to say to her. This was by far the most disgusting and offensive thing anyone has ever done to me. Since she wasn't home I decided to just get even. I took the trash bin up to her bedroom and tore the bag open and emptied it all onto her bed.

Looking back at this situation, I realize that I should have probably handled the situation differently but at the same time I don't regret what I did. I feel that I exhausted talking with her and she obviously felt the same way. We never spoke about what happened but for the rest of the year our bathroom was kept in good shape. I realize that I need to make better decisions when I pick my roommates. People are not always who you think they are, especially in a living situation.

This situation made me lose my faith in people respecting me and my personal feelings. I know now that I have to stand my ground so that people, particularly people I live with, won't walk all over me. If I don't stand up for myself, people will take me for granted and not care about me or my personal effects and beliefs. So what I learned is, in order to gain respect from people I have to not only make my feelings/beliefs known to them but also make sure that they know that I won't be pushed around or walked over.

Discussion Questions

1. Given the material in this chapter, how would you explain this student's personality?

2. Do you think she adjusted her conflict tactics to help her achieve her goals? Would a different strategy have worked? If so, which one—and why do you select it?

3. Is her conclusion about people fair? What would you say to her about this conclusion?

4. What goal(s) of hers were threatened? Why?

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Source: Canary Daniel J., Lakey Sandra. Strategic Conflict. Routledge,2012. — 272 p.. 2012

Locus of Control

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