Experimental study finds locus of control shapes sense of agency but not susceptibility to social influence in online adults, suggesting social alignment relies on distinct mechanisms.
OBJECTIVE: The sense of agency might be jointly affected by situational and interindividual factors. In this study, we examined whether personality traits and control beliefs can explain individual differences in both (1) sense of agency and (2) susceptibility of agency judgments to social influence. METHOD: To do so, we used measures of the Big Five Personality Traits and Levenson's Locus of Control in combination with a task based on an interactive computer game, which we submitted to a large cohort of online participants (N = 562). We manipulated sensorimotor agency cues related to action control as well as social information communicated to participants. RESULTS: Our results show that while locus of control beliefs are related to differences in sense of agency, neither Big Five personality traits nor locus of control beliefs can account for differences in susceptibility to social influence. CONCLUSION: Locus of control and Big Five personality traits can account for some differences in sense of agency, but not for differences in belief alignment.
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Carstensen et al. (2025) studied this question.
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