Feist−Feist: Theories of
Personality, Seventh
EditionV. Learning Theories 17. Rotter and Mischel:
Cognitive Social Learning
Theory© The McGraw−Hill^529
Companies, 2009control. However, as Rotter (1975, 1990) pointed out, too much internal control is
not always socially desirable. For example, Item 2 of the chapter opener taps into
a person’s generalized expectancy for omnipotence, hardly a socially desirable
attitude.
Rotter’s Internal-External Control Scale has become one of the most thor-
oughly investigated topics in psychology as well as in other social sciences, having
sparked several thousand publications since its inception. Despite this popularity, the
concepts of internal and external control are not always clearly understood. Although
Rotter (1975) pointed out several common misconceptions concerning internal and
external control of reinforcement (he seldom referred to it as “locus of control”),
people continue to misuse and misinterpret the instrument. One misconception is
that scores on the scale are determinants of behavior. Rotter insisted that they should
not be seen as causes of behavior but as indicators of generalized expectancies
(GEs). As such, they must be considered along with reinforcement value(RV) when
predicting behavior potential.
A second misconception is that locus of control is specific and can predict
achievement in a specific situation. Again, the concept refers to generalizedex-
pectancies of reinforcement and indicates the degree to which people generally be-
lieve that they are in control of their lives.
A third common misconception is that the scale divides people into two dis-
tinct types—internals and externals. Rotter (1975, 1990) insisted that generalized
expectancies imply a gradientof generalization and that, in certain specific situa-
tions, a person with generally high feelings of internal control may believe that the
outcome of his or her behavior is due mostly to fate, chance, or the behavior of pow-
erful others.
Fourth, many people seem to believe that high internal scores signify socially
desirable traits and that high external scores indicate socially undesirable character-
istics. Actually, extreme scores in either direction would be undesirable. Very high
external scores might be related to apathy and despair, with people believing that
they have no control over their environments, whereas extremely high internal scores
would mean that people accept responsibility for everything that happens to them—
business failure, delinquent children, other people’s misery, and thunder storms that
interfere with planned outdoor activities. Scores somewhere in between these ex-
tremes, but inclined in the direction of internal control, would probably be most
healthy or desirable.
Interpersonal Trust Scale
Another example of a generalized expectancy (GE) that has provoked considerable
interest and research is the concept of interpersonal trust.Rotter (1980) defined in-
terpersonal trust as “a generalized expectancy held by an individual that the word,
promise, oral or written statement of another individual or group can be relied on”
(p. 1). Interpersonal trust does not refer to the belief that people are naturally good
or that they live in the best of all possible worlds. Neither should it be equated with
gullibility. Rotter saw interpersonal trust as a belief in the communications of others
when there is no evidence for disbelieving, whereas gullibility is foolishly or naively
believing the words of other people.
Chapter 17 Rotter and Mischel: Cognitive Social Learning Theory 523