Description

The Reid-Ware Three-Factor Internal-External Scale (RWTFES) is a psychometric instrument designed to assess individuals’ perceptions of control over events and outcomes in their lives. Rather than treating locus of control as a single dimension, the scale examines it across three distinct domains: personal success, personal failure, and sociopolitical success.

This multidimensional approach provides a more detailed understanding of whether individuals tend to attribute outcomes to their own actions and abilities or to external factors such as chance, circumstances, or broader social conditions.

Aim

The primary aim of the Reid-Ware scale is to evaluate how individuals perceive their influence and control across different areas of life. By assessing these dimensions separately, the scale helps researchers and professionals better understand beliefs regarding personal control and the potential psychological and behavioral implications of these beliefs.

The instrument can therefore contribute to the study of how internal and external control orientations relate to adjustment, decision-making, motivation, and responses to success or failure.

Dimensions of the Scale

The RWTFES assesses three principal dimensions:

Personal Success: evaluates internal and external control beliefs associated with achievements and positive outcomes.

Personal Failure: assesses internal and external control beliefs related to failures and negative outcomes.

Sociopolitical Success: examines the degree of control individuals perceive themselves as having over sociopolitical issues and outcomes.

This structure allows individuals to demonstrate different control orientations across domains rather than being classified simply as globally internal or external.

Scoring and Analysis

Participants respond to a series of statements using a Likert-type scale, with the available material giving an example ranging from 1 = Not at all to 5 = Very much.

Responses are summed within each dimension to obtain scores reflecting internal and external locus of control. The resulting scores may then be interpreted separately for personal success, personal failure, and sociopolitical success.

Further statistical analysis may be conducted to examine relationships between the different locus-of-control dimensions and other psychological or social variables.

Standardization

According to the available material, standardization of the Reid-Ware scale involves studies using large and diverse samples in order to establish normative data and support the reliability and validity of the instrument. Scores may be standardized to facilitate meaningful comparisons across different populations.

Interpretation should nevertheless follow the scoring procedures and normative information provided for the specific version of the scale being used.

Applications

The RWTFES may be used in personality psychology, social psychology, educational research, organizational psychology, and studies of individual differences. It may be particularly useful for examining associations between locus of control and variables such as motivation, achievement, coping, decision-making, perceived competence, and social participation.

Its three-factor structure allows researchers to investigate whether control beliefs vary according to the type of outcome being considered, providing a more differentiated profile than a single overall locus-of-control score.

References

Reid, D. W., & Ware, E. E. (1973). Multidimensionality of internal-external control: Implications for past and future research. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 5(3), 264–270.

Rotter, J. B. (1966). Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement. Psychological Monographs: General and Applied, 80(1), 1–28.

Lefcourt, H. M. (1982). Locus of Control: Current Trends in Theory and Research. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Phares, E. J. (1976). Locus of Control in Personality. General Learning Press.

Wallston, K. A., Wallston, B. S., & DeVellis, R. (1978). Development of the Multidimensional Health Locus of Control (MHLC) scales. Health Education Monographs, 6(2), 160–170.