Ecological Investigation of Iranian Students’ Locus of Control Based on Complex Dynamic Systems Theory

Locus of Control (LOC) is a psychological construct that deals with people's perception of the extent to which they are in control of what happens to them and it has been proved to play a crucial role in one’s success or failure in various aspects of life. Although LOC is by no means a stable construct, the current body of research had a linear one-shot cause-effect perspective towards it. Hence, framed within a Complex Dynamic Systems Theory (CDST), this case study tries to revisit Iranian university students' LOC through the application of Dynamic Ensemble (DE). To this end, five students from Bojnord university who were attending their General English (GE) course participated in this study. The data collection was done through semi-structured interviews, task-motometers, students' journals, and participant classroom observations during seven classroom sessions. The collected data were qualitatively content analyzed by the application of MaxQDA software. Having analyzed the collected data, several macro-systemic, micro-systemic, and contextual factors were identified as being influential on the students' internality or externality of LOC. Considering the fact that many scholars believe internal LOC is the healthier attribute, this study focuses on the factors which can help teachers lead their students to become internalizers.