Motive congruence moderation: The effects of dependence and locus of control on implicit and self-attributed affiliation motive congruency and life satisfaction

The current study presents a conceptual framework for the moderation of the relationship between implicit and self-attributed motive congruency and psychological well-being. Consistent with this framework, we found evidence for such moderation effects for predicting life satisfaction in a secondary data analysis of a sample (N = 441) drawn from the Eugene-Springfield Community Sample longitudinal dataset. First, we found that, compared to low/low affiliation motive congruence, the positive effects (i.e., high life satisfaction) of high/high congruence were neutralized at high levels of dependence. Second, compared to low/low congruence, the negative effects of either type of affiliation motive incongruence (i.e., high/low, or low/high) were ameliorated at high levels of locus of control. The proposed conceptual framework not only offers a better predictive model of motive congruence moderation, it also directs our attention toward targeted interventions for increasing psychological well-being in the normal population.