Life events, perceived control and illness: the role of uncertainty

The health implications of recognizing the difference between situations that are controllable and those that are not has been noted by a variety of sources. With this notion in mind, the present study examined the relationship between perceptions of control and desirability of life events and subsequent health in a college student sample. Subjects indicated which of a list of life events had occurred to them over a three-month span and also specified how desirable each was and to what extent they were in control of its occurrence. Illness was reported for the following month. The results indicated that both undesirable uncontrollable events and undesirable events of uncertain controllability were significantly related to the occurrence of illness. Of greatest interest was the finding that the occurrence of events of uncertain controllability was more strongly related to illness than events perceived as totally uncontrollable. The results are discussed in terms of research and theory stressing the adaptative significance of the ability to discriminate controllable situations from uncontrollable ones.