Personality Traits, Locus of Control and COVID-19 Reported Behaviors in Housewives

Abstract

The current study assessed the relationship amongstpersonality traits, locus of control and COVID-19reportedbehaviors in housewives. Thestudy design was co-relational with snowball sampling. A sample of (N= 172) housewives was definedwithanage range between 18-60(M =38, SD= 10.79). The questionnaires used were Coronavirus Anxiety Scale (Lee, 2020), the Big Five Personality Inventory-K (Rammstedt & John, 2005), Levenson Multidimensional Locus of Control Scale (Levenson, 1973), Protective Behaviors towards COVID-19 Scale (Riad et al., 2020). Correlation analyses revealed extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness correlated positively,whereas neuroticism had a significant negative relationship with COVID-19 reportedroutine protective and post exposure risky behaviors.A significant positive relationship of internal locus of control with all of the COVID-19 reportedmeasures was found. Power other formof locus of control and chance related locus of control correlated negatively with all of sub-dimensions ofCOVID-19reportedbehaviors. Hierarchical linear regression indicated conscientious as a positive predictor of routine protective and post exposure risky behaviors related to COVID-19. Neuroticism was a significantly negative predictor of post exposure protective behaviors related to COVID-19. Openness and chance locus of control were identified as significant negative predictors of post exposure risky behaviors related to COVID-19. Internal locus of control and power other locus were significantly positive predictors of both routine protective and post exposure protective behaviors. Thuspresent study highlighted the importance of personality traits and locus of control in housewives for predicting their COVID-19 reportedprotective behaviors.