A feeling of control and school achievements and educational aspirations of adolescent people

This study concerns locus of control function for school achievements and educational aspirations of adolescents. It was assumed that the internal locus of control is generally more adaptive which does not mean that external locus of control must be dysfunctional. To test this hypothesis it was investigated the relation of academic locus of control to school achievements and educational aspirations among 396 adolescents. The results confirm the hypothesis only with respect to the relation between locus of control and girls' educational aspirations. Internal locus of control correlated both with 'high' and 'low' educational aspirations. External locus of control was the personal feature of these girls who preferred 'average' educational goals rather than the 'low' ones. Furthermore, girls with external locus of control achieved grades comparable to the male students with internal locus of control. In the sample of boys, internal locus of control correlated positively with their school achievements only and was of no importance for their educational aspirations.