Internality: an Educational Imperative

Abstract

in this article) as central to morality and humanismThe author defines the locus-of-control dimension and traces the development of mternalny-externahty measures The research findmgs regarding the correlation of mternality with desirable behavioral traits are presented with emphasis on personal well-bemg, educational significance, and social significance Training programs for internality are discussed, mcludmg elements to be considered in their construction and research reports regarding their effectiveness One such program, Achievement Competence Training (ACT) is described The implication of increased internality for personal and social benefit are explored National opinion polls and psychological research of the past decade indicate that Americans increasingly feel a sense of powerlessness to direct their lives. As big government and big business grow yet bigger, more of us believe we have lost control over the basic facts of our being: our environment and our destiny. To many, the traditionally respected virtues of autonomy and independence appear to be vanishing. THE LOCUS-OF-CONTROL CONCEPTPsychologists refer to the belief in personal power-or lack of it-over one's life as &dquo;belief in locus of control.&dquo; Although we all fall somewhere in between on this continuum, the two poles of locus-of-control belief are internals, those who believe their behavior determines what happens to them, and externals, those who believe their lives are controlled by powerful outside forces such as luck or fate.

Self-directed learning research: An imperative for transforming the educational landscape

“…That means that they believe that the success of their learning is a result of their own efforts. This can be contrasted with students with an external locus of control (Hill 1978). Such students believe that their success in learning is a result of forces beyond their control, forces acting on them.…”