The Relative Importance of Physical, Psychological, and Social Variables to Locus of Control Orientation in Middle Age

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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to determine through a systematic, multivariate approach, the relative importance of several physical, psychological, and social variables to the type of control that middle-aged adults perceive over their environment. The physical variables included self-rated health, age, sex, and race. The psychological variables included three measures of self concept: actual, appearance, and ideal; and the social variables included education, occupation, and religious motivation. The sample for the study consisted of 337 adults 45 to 65 years of age. When selected variables were categorically ordered, and their relative association with i-e examined, factors that were reflective of the process of acculturation such as self-concept, religious motivation, and occupation maintained the strongest relationship to perceived control. Jobs such as administrative and operative types that allowed for perceptions of control through the manipulation of people or machines, positive (actual) self-concept, and intrinsic religious motivation were predictive of internal perceiving adults.

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