Compliance with many health-promoting regimens is often poor, even among individuals with known chronic disease. Lifestyle changes recommended by cardiac rehabilitation educators are often not adopted or not maintained by clients having suffered myocardial infarction and/or coronary graft bypass surgery. Subjects were graduates (N=117) of a Phase II cardiac rehabilitation program in a major midwestern city. Subjects provided information on demographics, risk factor status, stress, details regarding their cardiac event, and retrospective views of the causes of their cardiac event. The Multidimensional Health Locus of Control (MHLOC) was included. MHLOC internal and chance scales were significantly correlated with retrospective views of the cardiac event on over one-half of the opportunities. The composite scales combining MHLOC internal and chance and combining MHLOC powerful others and chance successfully predicted retrospective views of the cardiac event in one-half of the cases. Causal attributions and the composite "Your Behavior" predicted almost one-half of the retrospective views. The MHLOC scales, and especially the composites, showed enough relationships to encourage this pursuit. Supplemented by other predictors, they may permit presentation of health messages with more effective content, messages better promoting secondary and primary prevention. (ABL)