Effects of Locus of Control and Relevance on Intentional and Incidental Memory for Passages
On the basis of a median split of their scores on Rotter's locus of control scale, 34 undergraduates were classified as internals and 36 as externals. All subjects read six passages representing three levels of relevance for lives of students under one of three sets of instructions. In the cued condition, subjects were informed that a memory test would follow four days later; in the uncued condition subjects rated the relevance of the passages; and in the pure uncued condition subjects summarized the passages Material of low relevance was remembered more poorly than those in the two higher levels, but internal and external students performed similarly in. all conditions. These results cast further doubt on the prediction from social learning theory that internal persons would be selectively superior to external ones on more relevant material in the uncued conditions.