Do you like to gamble???
Where would you head first in a casino in Las Vegas...
the poker tables or the slot machines?
 
 

       Well, according to a study by David Lester (1980), your gambling behaviors may be directly related to your locus of control behaviors.  If your favorite game is poker, you may be more internal in your sense of control, due to the fact that skill and judgment are involved when you play.  On the other hand, if slot machines are more your bag, this may indicate a tendency of externality in locus of control.  Lester conducted his study using 65 college students, giving them Rotter's locus of control scale and asking them if they had gambled in the last fifteen months.  He discovered that belief in an external locus of control was positively related to games such as roulette and craps and negatively related to poker.  "Thus, it appears that externally oriented college students are more likely to gamble at activities in which chance plays a large role, e.g. lotteries, slot machines, craps, and roulette, and less likely to gamble at activities in which skill and judgment can play a large role, e.g. poker."

Source:
Lester, D. (1980).  Choice of gambing activity and belief in locus of control.  Psychological Reports, 47, 22.
 

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This tutorial was produced for Psy 324, Advanced Social Psychology, Spring 1999 at Miami University.  All graphics are from the public domain, used with permission, or were created by the authors.  Social Psychology / Miami University (Ohio USA).  Last revised: . This document has been accessed times since 1 May 1999. Comments & Questions to R. Sherman