Manual
For
LOCUS OF CONTROL SCALE (LCS)
Dr. N. Hasnain
Deptt. o Psychology Goveromeot P.G. College
PITHORAGARH-262 502
and
Dr. D. D. Joshi
Deptt. of Education
1992
Ankur Psychological Agency
22/481 fedira Nagar, Luckn ow- 16
INTRODUCTION
The concept of locus of codtrol Was propUunded by
Rollee
(1954) and developed by Rotter (1954, 1955, 1960 and 1966),
Rotter, Chance add Phares (1972), Decharms (1968), Wciner (1973
and Lefcourt (1976). Locus of control is a construct cmbedded in
ocial learviog theory of Rotter. It stresses the role of
expectancy
and reinforcement value related with the outcome of bchaviours or
eveats. Statiog in terms of expectancy and reinforcement it indicates
a person's expectancies or perceptions concerning ih: fuoctional
relationship between the behavioural eveots and reinforcing eveois.
It is generalized expectancy being an abstraction from the host of
expericnces in which expectancics have met with varying degrees ofr
satisfaction (Lefcourt, 1972). The outcome of events referred to as
reioforcers are perceived either interoal or exteroal by differeat
persons. Internal locus of control refers to believes and outcomes
of events or rewards are controlled by the individual's owa ability,
bebaviours, and efforts and exteroal locus of control meaos the
believes that outcomes of events or rewards are not codirolled
by
the individual's own ability or efforts but by somcone outside kim-
self, like luck, fate, and significant others. The interoal-exie:nal
dimensions are regarded as a continuum and not as
framework.
typological
Need of the Scale
Ioternalexternal cootiouum has been found to be related with
maoy psychological and
personality factors, like, N-achievemen,
competence, personal causation, striving for superiority and anomie
etc. It bas maoy behavioural
aod decision making consequeacces
which may bring happpiness or hell to the iadividuals. It is,
therefore, necessary to bave a reliable and valid tool to asure
such an important cOnstruet.
There is Rotters (1966) originul E
scale but that is based and
other than lodiao odes. Nodeveloped in the socio-cultural coadito
doubt there are some ladiao versioo
also but they are in
English language and are heavily basE on
Rotter's iems. So mucb that some of the Hiadi versio0 ntef
very
difficult aod tedious is seoriog. time
consumiog aad dnandardi
pretatioo. The preent acale was iherefore
zed to provide ao easy scale to developed a0d Stadmi:
Iadian researcbers with easy
tntioo aod
scoriog system and ioterpretation techaiques.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE SCALE
Item Amlysis
Try oul and
interoal and external loeus of control
were
41 items based n
that 18 positive and
constructed and were assembled io such way
a
tbat
items appeared in a raodomized order. The items
23 negative and items that
were trcated as positive
reveal ioternal locus of control These items
were taken as ncgative.
reveal external locus of control
on 500 randomly selected
students studying in B.A.
were tried out
Government Post Graduate College,
Pithoragarh.
aod B.Ed. classes of females. The subjects
were males and 250 were
Among them 250
categories-"Always', 'Some
responded to the items in terms of three
times'. and 'Never.
into acouot tbe s:ores of
The itenm analysis was made takiog of
Discrimioative Powers (DP's)
00 sudjects. For this purpose.
Goode aod
the method suggested by
these items were calculated by and Hatt,
Hatt (1952). According to
the rules suggested by Goode
0'5 and above 1 00 were dropped except
th: items haviug DP below
and three
wo items having DP
of 122. Five items (two positive
36 items were retained in the fioal
oegative) were thus dropped.
20 oegative item.
scale. the1n there are 16 positive and
Among
Instructions
page of the test booklet.
The iostructions are given on the cover
Th:y are simple and self-explanatory.
SCORING
the scale. The
presedtscale is a three-point
As mentioned above
and Never'.
testees bave to respond io terms of 'Always', 'Sometimes',
Scores of 2. I and 0 are givento the positive items lor 'Always',
Sometimes', and Never" respectively. The scoriog un ocgative items
are done in a reverse order. The bighest score on the scale is 72 and
the lowest is 0. Sioce the positive items are related with ioteroal
locus of cootrol, the higher the score on the scale the more internally
oiented the individual will be.
RELIABILITY
Coeicient of reliability was caleulsted usiog the following
metbods:
() Internal Cosisteney. The internal cousistvacy voçtlicicat
of reliability was determined by odd-oven procedure (N= 50) usiog
Spearmao-Browo Propbecy formula. The reliubility coeicieot thus
calculated was found to be 0 5.
4
(2) Temporal Stability.
Test-retest (N=50) method
reliability cocfficient of temporal stability afler a
for the
was found to be 0 76. gap of two wecke
VALIDITY
The validity
of the scale was found by calculating the
of correlation (N=50) between the scores of coeffcient
and on Roma Pal's (1983) scale. The cocfficient
subjects this scale
on
of correlation thus
calculated came to be 0.76. Moreover Critical Ratio
between the
means of girls (N=250) and
boys (N=250) was obtained to be 5:87
which was significant beyond 0-01 level of
significance. The means
of girls and boys wcre obtaincd to be 2083 and
Thus the girls
19 23 respectively.
were
sigoificantly more internally orieoted than boys.
NORMS
Percentile combined norms of girls and boys and
norms for girls and boys are separate
given in Tables I, 2 and 3 respectively.
TABLE 1
Combined Percentile Norms for Girls and
Boys (N=500)
Percentiles Scores
Interpretation
99
95
7015
64-65j Extremely Internally Orieoted
90
80 6162 Highly Interoally Orieated
15 (Q,) S618
54 56 Ioternally Oriented
70 S1 98)
60
50 (Mdo) 48 60
40 4562Normal (loteroally-Exteroally
30 41-92 Oriented)
37-92)
25 (Q) 35 83
20 33-55j Externally Oriented
10
27*75
OS Higaly Exteroally Orieoted
2205
Extremely Exteroally Orieoted
Meao=44:74
S. D.=12 66
Mioimum Marks=00
Maximum Marks=712
TABLE 2
Percentile Norms for
Girls (N= 250)
Interprelation
Scores
Percentiles
Oricoted
71 38) Extremely Internally
99
62 69 Orieoted
95 Highly Internally
5925
90
5404 nternally
Into Oriented
80
75 (Q)
52:31
70 49Normal (laternally-Externally
60
50 (Mdo) 4707 Oriented)
4425
40
4033
30
382 Externally Oricoted
25 (Q) 3617
20 Exteroally Orieoted
3 13 Highly Orieated
10 23 63 Extremely Exteroally
05
Meao=4576
S. D.=1l-72
Miaimum Marks=00
Maximum Marks=72
TABLE 3
Percentile Norms
for Boys (N=250)
Interpretation
Scores
Percentiles
Oriented
6936 Extremely Internally
99 62 23 Orieoted
95 63-00 Highly
Internally
90
5706
54-00 Internally Orieoted
80
75 (Q3)
5150) and
70 Orieoted
Normal (Internally
60 .
4336 Exteroally Oriented)
50 (Mdn) 39-67
40
30
3550J
33-42 Externally Oriented
25 (Q,)
20
31-33 Oriented
26'15 Highly Externally Oriented
10 Extremely Exteroally
21 54
05
Meao=43.72
S. D.==13:46
Mioimum Marks=00
Maximum Marks=72
7
TABLE 4
Items and tbelr Scoriog
Distribution of Positive and Negative
Scbemes
16
Positive Items
1, 3, 6, 7, 9, 13, 15,
34 aad
18, 23, 26, 27, 29, 30,
(Ioterval
Locus of Control): 35 16
Scoriog Schemc: 2
12, 14, 17
2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11,
24, 25, 28,
Negative Items
19, 20, 21, 22,
Control) 36=20
(External
Locus of 31, 32, 33, and
2
Scoring Scheme
REFERENCES
l Afective
The Afective Deter.
nternal
Cusution:
Archarms
(1968) Personal York: Acad-mic Press.
New
minants of Behaviour.
Methods in Sociul Resear
earch.
P. K. (1952)
Goode. W.
J. and Hatt,
New York. McGraw-Hill.
locus of control. In Experi.
In Experi
A study of
Lefcourt, H. M. (1972) New York:
Academic Press,
Research,
mental Personality York Halsted
New York:
Control. :
(1976): Locus of
Lefcourt, H.M.
Press. scale. Agra: Agra
Manual for locus of contral
Roma Pal (1983)
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New
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Jersey: Prentice-Hall.
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Tbe role of Psychological
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on
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Rotter, J. B. (1960)
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301-316.
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versus
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