Belief in a Day of Judgment and locus of control in university students from three nations: Iran, Turkey and the USA

Abstract

ABSTRACT The aim of the study was to explore the association between Belief in Day of Judgment (BDJ) and belief in locus of control (LCS) in samples from three nations: Iran, Turkey and the USA. A scale devised by Beshai and Lester to measure Belief in a Day of Judgment (BDJS) and Multidimensional Locus of Control Scale (MLCS) for internal, powerful others, or chance loci of control were administered to 386 students. Age was not associated with BDJ in the American students, while sex was not associated with BDJ for any of the three samples. The Iranian sample had higher scores for internal control, while the Turkish sample had higher scores for BDJ. In addition, belief in an internal locus of control predicted BDJ, but only for the Iranian sample. Thus, there were differences between these three cultures in their mean score for BDJ and LCS and the associations between the scale scores.