Poster #9 - Profiles of Impulsive Responding: Domain-Specificity and Relations to Development and Adjustment

• In Event: 2-110 - Poster Session 07
  In Poster Session: PS 07 Section - Attention, Learning, Memory

Integrative Statement

Impulsivity, reflecting the speed with which one initiates a response to a stimulus, is one of the core constructs describing an individual’s temperament – stable individual difference characteristics that describe personality (Rothbart, Ahadi, & Hershey, 1994). However, this characteristic may be further subdivided into domains of impulsive responding (e.g., attentional, motor, cognitive). Although behaviors can be clustered into these distinct categories, to the extent that they all represent this inherent rush to response and may differ only based on the nature of that response, a question remains as to the distinctness vs. unification of the impulsivity construct. The identification of distinct underlying dimensions of impulsivity, that are related to unique developmental influences and have unique consequences for adaptation, can provide evidence for the domain specific vs. general nature of impulsivity, and further understanding of its development.
500 undergraduate students (68% Female; 48% Hispanic; Mean Age = 19.51) completed the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (Patton et al., 1995). This scale contains 30 items and is scored from 1 (rarely/never) to 4 (almost always/always). It contains six subscales: attention, cognitive instability, motor, perseverance, self-control, and cognitive complexity. A latent profile analysis was conducted to identify groups of individuals with patterns of elevations across the subscales.
After comparing possible 3- through 8-profile solutions, the 7-profile solution was selected. Fit improved across all metrics (e.g., decreased AIC, A-BIC), peaking at this solution, with particular attention increased entropy (70.3% of individuals correctly classified) and a significant LMRT p value, indicating that the 7-profile solution was a significantly better fit than the 6-profile solution. The profiles of impulsiveness identified were “Low” (N = 118), “Motor Only” (N = 60), “Moderate” (N = 203), “Attention/Cognitive” (N = 70), “Attention Only” (N = 23), “High [with Low Perseverance]” (N =6), and “High” (N = 20). The low, moderate, and high profiles were expected, reflecting varying degrees of impulsiveness but unity across domains. Domain specific profiles that emerged highlighted subgroups high in motor impulsivity vs. attention and/or cognitive impulsivity, and these profiles were of substantial size to indicate that for some individuals impulsivity is a domain specific characteristic. Next, validation analyses (ANOVA with Bonferroni post hoc comparisons) compared levels of child maltreatment (Bernstein & Fink, 1998) and adjustment outcomes (Gratz & Roemer, 2004; Derogatis, 1993) across profiles (Figure 1). Child maltreatment, across all subtypes except physical abuse, was significantly elevated in individuals with profiles high in attention and/or cognitive impulsivity specifically. Similarly, emotion regulation difficulties and psychopathological symptoms were elevated specifically among individuals high in attention and/or cognitive impulsivity. One exception was hostility, which was only elevated among individuals with “High” impulsivity. However, overall there were no specific elevations for motor impulsivity (although externalizing problems such as ADHD symptoms were not measured).
These results highlight the salience of attention/cognitive impulsivity specifically as potentially most vulnerable to developmental insult and relevant for adjustment outcomes, and confirm that not all profiles of impulsive responding are unified across domains.

Author

• Sara R. Berzenski, California State University, Northridge
  Presenting Author