1.8. Locus of control
Tokunaga (1993) suggested that people with a strongly external locus of
control were more likely to get into debt. Since debt is associated with
poverty, and poorer people tend to give external reasons for economic
phenomena such as poverty and unemployment (e.g. Feagin, 1972), causal- ity may run the other way. In either case, however, there should be a
positive correlation between external locus of control and debt.