Measuring Self-Control Beliefs: A Multidimensional and Domain-Specific Perspective

Self-control allows people to align their behaviour with intention in the face of a motivational conflict. Lay beliefs about self-control are associated with self-control performance. However, previous research has focused on whether self-control is seen as a limited resource in the short term and mostly ignored beliefs about whether self-control is malleable in the long term. We examined these two aspects of lay beliefs in two preregistered questionnaire studies with adult UK participants (n₁ = 182, n₂ = 199). In both studies, beliefs about the limitedness and malleability of self-control were relatively independent of each other. Moreover, limitedness beliefs varied depending on the self-control domain. Self-control beliefs were related to but relatively distinct from self-esteem, self-efficacy, and trait self-control. Beliefs about the malleability of self-control were moderately associated with beliefs about the malleability of overall personality, but not with beliefs about intelligence. Our results support a multidimensional and domain-specific approach when measuring self-control beliefs.