Main description:

Human beings are agents: They may exert influence over their own fate. They initiate their actions, experience a considerable degree of freedom and control in their mundane activities, and respond adversely to external constraints to their agency; they are able to monitor and modify their moti- vation, affective states, and behavior. Since the sixties, the notion of person-as-agent has become increas- ingly accepted in scientific psychology. Nowadays, personal control is a standard topic in research on personality, motivation, and social behavior. The most popular approach identifies personal control with a feeling or judgment: To have control means to perceive the self as a source of causa- tion. Within this perspective, such consciously accessible contents like perceived freedom and self-determination, feelings and expectations of control, or perceived self-efficacy and competence emerge as natural tar- gets of research (see e.g., Alloy, Clements, & Koenig, 1993; Bandura, 1977; OeCharms, 1968; Oeci & Ryan, 1985; Harvey, 1976; Rotter, 1966; Thomp- son, 1993; Wortman, 1975).

Contents:

The Person as an Agent of Control: Personal Control from the Perspective of Cognitive-Experiential Self-Theory; S. Epstein. Dynamics in the Coordination of Mind and Action; R.R. Vallacher, et al. Opening Versus Closing Strategies in Controlling One's Responses to Experience; M. Rosenbaum. A Terror Management Perspective on the Psychology of Control: Controlling the Uncontrollable; T. Pyszczynski, et al. Affective and Cognitive Mechanisms of Executive Agency: The Emotional Control of Behavior; J.W. Brehm, B.H. Brummett. Mood Management: The Role of Processing Strategies in Affect Control and Affect Infusion; J.P. Forgas, et al. Ability Perception and Cardiovascular Response to Behavioral Challenge; R.A. Wright. Confirmation Bias: Cognitive Error or Adaptive Strategy of Action Control?; M. Lewicka. Threatened Personal Control: Mobilization versus Demobilization: To Control or Not to Control; D. Dolinski. Interpersonal Power Repair in Response to Threats to Control from Dependent Others; D.B. Bugental, J.C. Lewis. Control Motivation, Depression, and Counterfactual Thought; K.D. Markman, G. Weary. 6 Additional Chapters. Index.