A Study on Locus of Control among College Students of Gulbarga City

The current study focuses on locus of control and the difference in it among different demographic variables such as gender (male and female), course of study (science and arts) and locality (urban and rural) among college students. It is a promising area of inquiry. The age of college students is the age of developing their personality and is a critical context for studying personality. The study was conducted on 171 college student of Gulbarga city who were selected by a random sampling method (lottery method). The questionnaire consisted of personal data sheet, and Rotter’s locus of control scale. Descriptive Statistics and non-parametric statistics as Mann-Witney test (U) were used to analyze the data. The results could not find significant difference on locus of control among males & females, science & arts and urban & rural college students.

Since locus of control refers to the individuals' belief about controllability over what happens to them in life, it is defined as a personality trait or construct that reveals how individuals perceive their ability to control life events or environment . This belief can be characterized as one continuum on which two extremes can be recognized: internal locus of control and external locus of control.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
This study is significant because the study can provide the idea about the personality, which may helpto improve the existing services or create new services to help people to have more control in an environment where they usually feel out of control.

METHODOLOGY OF THE STUDY
This study is undertaken to make an attempt for understanding the Locus of Control among college students of Gulbarga city, along with the influence of demographic variables such as gender, place of residence and the course of study.

OBJECTIVES:
The study will be conducted with the following objectives: 1. To study the difference in Locus of control among male and female college students of Gulbarga city. 2. To study the difference in Locus of control among Arts and science college students of Gulbarga city. 3. To study the difference in Locus of control among Urban and Rural college students of Gulbarga city. 4. To study the level of locus of control among college students of Gulbarga city.

HYPOTHESES:
The study will be conducted with the following general hypotheses: 1. There would be a significant difference on locus of control among male and female college students. 2. There would be a significant difference on locus of control among science and arts college students. 3. There would be a significant difference on locus of control among rural and urban college students.

Population:
The population for the present study consists of students studying in different degree colleges of Gulbarga City which are affiliated to Gulbarga University and pursuing courses of

Sampling technique:
The samples were taken from different colleges of Gulbarga city which are affiliated to Gulbarga University. The colleges were selected by random sampling using the lottery method. There are 35 total colleges in city. The researcher had divided theses colleges in three categories based on courses selected for the study. First category consists of the college in which both arts and science courses are taught; in second category the colleges were selected in which science courses are taught and in third category the colleges were selected among which there are arts courses. Among the colleges which are having both science and arts streams the researcher had selected four colleges by lottery method and from the science stream college's two colleges were selected and two more from arts stream colleges. The data was collected from selected colleges by randomly choosing classes through lottery method. In some classes which were selected for data were large number of students. The researcher had chosen the sample among all odd roll numbers. Using this process, the researcher had collected data from 184 sample among which 171 were selected for final analysis. The remaining had incomplete information.

Sources of the data:
For the study, only primary data was used. The data required for the study was collected using questionnaires that were distributed among the sample chosen from the population that were the students studying in various colleges in Gulbarga.

Inclusion criteria:
 The students who are studying in Degree College in Gulbarga city.  Those who are in the age range of 16-25 years.  Those who can read write and communicate in English.

Exclusion criteria:
 Students in Gulbarga city not studying B.A. and B.Sc.

Rotter's Locus of Control Scale:
It is the Indian adaption of Julian Rotter's Internal-External scale by Dr.Anand Kumar and Dr. S.N. Srivastava of Kashi Vidyapith University, Varanasi. It measures an individual's perception of internal / external control of various events. This is a forced choice instrument which consists of 29 pairs of statements; each item has two sentence choices. Subject has to select one statement from each pair which he or she believes more strongly.

Procedure:
The participants were welcomed and rapport was established. The researcher gave brief information about the purpose of the study and informed consent had been taken from them. Each participant was reminded that their participation was completely voluntary, and that their responses would remain anonymous and reported only in aggregate form. And a request to fill up the demographic data sheet where information regarding their name, age, gender, education, and place. The participants were instructed to read the statement carefully and to select any option as their response from the scales. Participants completed a battery of self-report questionnaires including Locus of Control statement sheet. After completing the questionnaires, participants were debriefed and were thanked for their participation.

Statistical Analysis:
The present study had utilize quantitative techniques that includes descriptive statistics. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) generates means, standard deviations, and frequencies for a list of variables, and non-parametric statistics were used for analysis which includes Mann-Witney test (U).  While examining the Locus of control of college students, it is found that there was no significant difference between male and female students on the basis gender (Mann-Witney U=3619.500, p>.05). While examining the Locus of control of college students, it is found that there wasn't a significant difference between science and arts students on the basis of course of study (Mann-Witney U=3054.500, p>.05). While examining the Locus of control of college students, it is found that there was not a significant difference between rural and urban students based on locality (Mann-Witney U=3614.500, p>.05).