Role of Mindfulness and Psychological Wellbeing Between External Locus of Control and Depression: A Moderated Mediation Model

The present research aimed at examining the role of mindfulness and psychological wellbeing in the relationship between external locus of control and depression. Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (Baer, 2003), Ryff Scale of Wellbeing (Ryff, 1989), DAAS Depression Subscale (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995), and Rotter’s Locus of Control Scale (Rotter, 1966) were administered on a convenient sample of three hundred and four (N=304) adults of Sargodha city (Punjab, Pakistan) to operationalize mindfulness, psychological wellbeing, depression, and external locus of control respectively. Results revealed that external locus of control had positive relationship with mindfulness whereas mindfulness and psychological wellbeing were negatively related with depression. Mindfulness fully mediated between external locus of control and depression. Psychological wellbeing moderated between mindfulness and depression by dampening their negative relationship. Moderated mediation analysis was undertaken through PROCESS macro for SPSS (Hayes, 2013), which revealed that conditional indirect relationship of external locus of control with depression was significant only at lower to moderate levels of psychological wellbeing. Implications of the study and suggestions for further research were discussed.