The relationship among locus of control, coping styles, and psychological symptom reporting

One hundred two subjects provided locus of control, coping style, psychological symptom, and related information. While locus of control and other predictors were related individually to reports of symptomatology, multiple regressions showed only direct coping strategies and lower reported perceptions of stressfulness as consistently predicting reduced symptom reporting; they generally predicted 25 to 35% of the variance in symptomatology. Direct coping, in turn, was found to be predicted strongly by the combination of increased age, perceptions of the controllability of situations, and an internal locus of control. Older subjects reported fewer attributions to chance locus of control, more direct coping, and less symptomatology, which suggests a possible developmental trend toward better adjustment in these relatively young adults.