Background: Locus of control as a theoretical construct derives from Julian B. Rotter’s [1] social learning theory of personality. Locus of control is the person’s trait to attribute their successes or failures only to internal or only external factors; it refers to an individual’s perception about the underlying main causes of events in his/her life.

Objectives: The aim of the study was to investigate the level of locus of control in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus, primary fibromyalgia syndrome, and osteoarthritis.

Methods: The level of locus of control was studied in 87 patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), 100 patients with fibromyalgia (F) and 27 patients with osteoarthritis (OA), using the Subjective Control Level (SCL) questionnaire [2].

Results: Patients with SLE show a pronounced tendency to externality in the general sphere, as well as in the sphere of failure (3.63±0.34), work related sphere (3.42±0.21), interpersonal relations, and especially in relation to health (3.31 ±0.32).

The study of SCL in patients with F allowed to note a significant decrease of scales in the spheres of general internality (2.98±0.31), internality in the field of achievements (3.08±0.34) and failures (3.42±0.30), interpersonal relations (3.54±0.25) and health (2.87±0.32), that indicates the externality of the F patients’ attitudes according to these scales.

Patients with OA has a pronounced tendency to externality in the general sphere (3.81 + 1.387), as well as on the scales of internality in the area of failures (3.51 + 0.64), family relationships (4.18 + 0.55), work related sphere (2.74 + 0.98) and in relation to health (4.66 + 1.94). In the sphere of interpersonal relations and on the scale of internality in the field of achievements, internal tendencies are observed (5.14 + 0.71 and 5.0 + 1.24, respectively).

Thus, the role of the sick man, that is assimilated to some extent by most patients with rheumatic diseases, and the symptoms of the disease form a feeling of helplessness in the patients, the need for sympathy and care from others, the hope that the improvement in the condition will be the result of external factors that do not depend on the patient himself. These changes may make it difficult to carry out effective therapy measures and, in turn, are the target of psychology intervention.

Conclusion: Thus, the successful treatment of rheumatic diseases requires the active involvement of a patients in the therapy process, as well as changes in their attitudes and lifestyles. The condition of the majority of patients can be significantly improved if the patient and the doctor can form a working partnership and the patient becomes an active participant in the treatment process, gains experience in controlling the situation, takes responsibility for strict adherence to the treatment and rehabilitation regimen. Some psychotherapy methods can be used in order to achieve these goals.

REFERENCES:

[1]Rotter, J. B. (1954). Social Learning and Clinical Psychology. Prentice-Hall.

[2]Bazhin E. F., Golynkina E. A., Etkind A. M. (1984) Metod issledovaniya urovnya sub’ektivnogo kontrolya [Method of Researching of Level of Subjective Control]. Psikhologicheskiy zhurnal [Psychological Journal], 1984, vol. 5, no. 3, pp. 36–42 (in Russian).

Disclosure of Interests: None declared