Impulsive Sensation Seeking Research Articles

Personality and risk-taking: common biosocial factors.

The first part of this article describes a study of the relationships between personality and risk-taking in six areas: smoking, drinking, drugs, sex, driving, and gambling. The participants, 260 college students, were given self-report measures of risky behaviors in each of the six areas and the Zuckerman-Kuhlman five-factor personality questionnaire. Generalized risk-taking (across all six areas) was related to scales for impulsive sensation seeking, aggression, and sociability, but not to scales for neuroticism or activity. Gender differences on risk-taking were mediated by differences on impulsive sensation seeking. The second part discusses biological traits associated with both risk-taking and personality, particularly sensation seeking, such as the D4 dopamine receptor gene. the enzyme monoamine oxidase, and augmenting or reducing of the cortical evoked potential. Comparative studies show relationships between biological markers shared with other species and correlated behaviors similar to sensation seeking in humans. A biosocial model of the traits underlying risk-taking is presented.

A role for complement in antibody-mediated inflammation: C5 deficient DBA/1 mice are resistant to collagen-induced arthritis

This study aimed to determine which personality dimension(s) as measured by the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire best explain a given coping strategy as measured by the COPE-48. Additionally, to clarify the location of these strategies in the broader framework of personality structure. Neuroticism-Anxiety contributed mostly to strategies focused on emotions, acceptance and denial, Activity to proactive and resolute strategies, and Sociability to obtaining emotional support and advice. Moreover, Impulsive Sensation-Seeking contributed to denial and substance use while Aggression-Hostility to focus on and venting of emotions, and inversely to restrain coping. Besides, we replicated the approach-avoidance axis and obtained an independent component grouping Religion and the inverse of Drugs, Humor and Impulsive Sensation-Seeking. Positioning coping strategies within the well-known, broader and multidimensional space of personality structure may help in a better understanding of its organization and a rethinking of its conceptualization including their underlying neurobiological basis, ultimate evolutionary nature and survival functions.

DEVELOPMENT OF A CHINESE VERSION OF THE ZUCKERMAN-KUHLMAN PERSONALITY QUESTIONNAIRE: RELIABILITIES AND GENDER/AGE EFFECTS

A five-factor model of the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ) was tried in a Chinese speaking area. Three hundred and thirty-three healthy subjects (217 women and 116 men) with a wide range of occupations attended this study and were divided into 5 age ranges. They were free of depression and answered with low dissimulation in ZKPQ. The principal component analysis detected 16 factors with eigenvalues larger than 1.5, the first 5 of which accounted for 21.0% of the variance. The five-factor solution analysis was, therefore, performed. The alpha internal reliabilities of the five personality scales ranged from 0.61 to 0.81. Sixty-one out of 89 items loaded larger than, or equal to, 0.3 on target factors. Scale scores were comparable to those reported in the United States, and the intercorrelations between five personality scales were lower. Gender and education level had little effect on the personality measures; the Impulsive Sensation Seeking declined with age only from 20 years on, in women. This study demonstrates the validity of the ZKPQ in Chinese culture.

Personality correlates of the dopaminergic facilitation of incentive motivation: Impulsive sensation seeking rather than extraversion?

Depue & Collins associate dopaminergically mediated incentive motivational processes with extraversion. In this commentary I consider dopaminergic indices from neuroimaging investigations which correlate more closely with impulsive sensation seeking personality traits than with extraversion. Measures of relevant behavioural processes also appear to correlate with personality measures other than extraversion.

Sensation seeking among high- and low-risk sports participants

Investigated were the sensation seeking tendencies of a diverse sample of 166 athletes. The main aim of the study was to assess empirical support for Zuckermans (1994)Impulsive-Sensation-Seeking (ImpSS) theory and to replicate and extend previous research findings in this area using high- and low-risk sport participants. The Sensation Seeking Scale-V ( Zuckerman et al., 1978) and the Impulsiveness Scale of the Impulsiveness-Venturesome-Empathy Scale ( Eysenck and Eysenck, 1978), were administered to both male and female athletes currently engaged in one of eight sport disciplines: Hang-gliding, mountaineering, sky-diving, automobile racing, swimming, marathon running, aerobics or golf. Results provided support for the main thrust of Zuckermans ImpSS theory (a) that sensation seeking is integrated within a broader trait called Impulsive-Sensation Seeking; and (b) that total sensation seeking differentiated between high- and low-risk sport participants. On the other hand, these participants did not differ on the impulsiveness dimension. These and other findings are integrated with respect to Zuckermans (1994)Impulsive-Sensation Seeking model. Limitations of the present study and suggestions for future research are also discussed.

Personality characteristics of male and female participants in team sports

Males members of two college teams, baseball and football, and female members of two teams, field hockey and lacrosse (combined) and equestrians, were compared on the five scales of the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ). All teams were significantly higher on the Activity and lower on the Neuroticism-Anxiety scales than the general college population of the University of Delaware. Lacrosse and field hockey athletes were higher on activity than equestrians and baseball players were higher than football players on this scale. Contrary to predictions, football players scored lower than the general university male population on Impulsive Sensation Seeking and the lacrosse and field hockey players did not differ from the general college females on Impulsive Sensation Seeking. The baseball players also scored lower on this scale. The hypothesis that body contact sports attract high sensation seeking and aggressive participants was not supported. Sensation seeking is more characteristic of participants in high risk sports offering unusual sensation and personal challenges.

Adjudicated adolescent males: measures of urinary 5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid and reactive hypoglycemia

A psychological model identified as the ‘low serotonin syndrome’ has been posited to explain the associated between certain biological characteristics such as low levels of the serotonin metabolite 5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid (5-HIAA) and reactive hypoglycemia; and aggressive, violent, or impulsive behavior. Thirty-seven male adolescents adjudicated for violent offenses were compared with 37 middle school adolescents on the following measures: urinary 5-HIAA levels, response to the glucose tolerance test (GTT), and scores on the Impulsive Sensation Seeking (ImpSS) and Aggression-Hostility (AGG-Host) subscales of the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ). The mean urinary 5-HIAA value in the adjudicated subjects was significantly lower than the 5-HIAA mean for the middle school controls. In response to the GTT, the mean blood glucose nadir recorded for the adjudicated group was also significantly lower than the glucose nadir mean obtained from the control subjects. Scores on the ImpSS subscale did not differ significantly whereas the adjudicated adolescents scored significantly higher on the Agg-Host subscale than did the control subjects.

A Five-Factor Model of Personality and Addiction, Psychiatric, and AIDS Risk Severity in Pregnant and Postpartum Cocaine Misusers

The relationship between addiction severity, psychiatric symptoms, AIDS risk behaviors, and an alternative five-factor measure of personality, the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire, was assessed in 92 cocaine-misusing pregnant and postpartum women in an inner city outpatient treatment program. Three of the personality traits (Neuroticism-Anxiety, Impulsive Sensation Seeking, Aggression-Hostility) were significantly related to different subscales of the Addiction Severity Index, Beck Depression Inventory, various psychiatric symptoms, and high HIV risk sexual activity. Of these traits, Neuroticism-Anxiety seemed to be the most powerful predictor of symptom severity for this sample of women. Scores on the personality dimensions were not related to recency, frequency, amount, or duration of drug use or to treatment outcomes.

The personality of prostitutes

Thirty-two female prostitutes and 32 controls were compared on the five scales of the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ) and responses to a semi-structured interview. It was predicted that prostitutes would score higher on the Impulsive Sensation Seeking (ImpSS) and Aggression-Hostility (Agg-Host) scales. Differences between the groups on age and education were controlled by analysis of covariance. The ANCOVA showed the prostitutes scoring significantly higher on ImpSS than the controls. Cocaine users among the prostitutes scored higher on ImpSS than other drug users and nonusers. Polydrug users scored higher than non-drug or single drug users on ImpSS. In accord with other research and the model for the ZKPQ, the results suggest that prostitutes are characterized by antisocial personality traits.

Item revisions in the Sensation Seeking Scale Form V (SSS-V)

Several items of the Sensation Seeking Scale which had become dated or irrelevant to current generations were modified, but some investigators are apparently unaware of these modifications. This note describes the item-changes and a new scale, ‘Impulsive Sensation Seeking’ which has no description of specific activities.

Psychopathy, passive-avoidance learning and basic dimensions of personality

This study examined the relations between basic dimensions of personality and passive-avoidance learning (PAL) deficit in psychopathic and nonpsychopathic criminals. Subjects were 79 male, medium-security federal prison inmates. PAL was measured using a computer game, and degree of psychopathy was assessed by the Psychopathy Checklist. Each subject also completed personality questionnaires. The relationship between PAL and psychopathy was only significant for White subjects. The personality measure that showed the most consistent relationship with psychopathy was Impulsive Sensation Seeking (ImpSS), but the relationship was only significant for Whites, and not for Blacks and Hispanics. The inconsistent findings between ethnic groups was discussed in terms of a limited understanding of ethnic differences in the field of personality and psychopathology. Among the personality traits, only ImpSS significantly predicted passive-avoidance learning errors. The relationships between ImpSS and both psychopathy and passive-avoidance learning are discussed in terms of Zuckerman's ( Psychobiology of Personality, 1991) psychobiological theory of personality.

The validity of an alternative five-factor measure of personality in cocaine abusers.

The validity of an alternative 5-factor measure of personality, the Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ), was assessed in 450 cocaine abusers seeking outpatient treatment. As predicted, the ZKPQ Impulsive Sensation Seeking (ImpSS), Neuroticism-Anxiety (N-Anx), and Aggression-Hostility (Agg-Hos) scales were associated with greater drug abuse and psychiatric severity and symptoms and worse outcome (p < .01 ). The Sociability and Activity scales were not correlated with symptoms or severity. The internal consistency and factor structure of the ZKPQ in this clinical sample was consistent with that found in nonclinical college samples. However, ImpSS, N-Anx, and Agg-Hos were more strongly correlated with each other and grouped together in cluster analyses to define a more severe subtype of cocaine abusers.

P-impulsive sensation seeking and its behavioral, psychophysiological and biochemical correlates.

Impulsive unsocialized sensation seeking (ImpUSS) is a major factor discovered in factor analyses of scales used in psychobiological research. It is strongly convergent with Eysenck's P dimension and conscientiousness in the 'big five'. The components of the dimension and the P scale, have been validated as correlates of various kinds of disinhibited behaviors, criminality, sexuality, and substance use and abuse. ImpUSS is related to a failure in passive avoidance learning, probably as a function of impulsivity and attention to reward stimuli. Psychophysiological markers for the trait include strong orienting and weak defensive reflexes and an augmenting, rather than reducing, of cortical reaction to intense stimuli. At the neurochemical level the trait is related to low levels of monoamine oxidase (MAO) and the neurotransmitters norepinephrine and serotonin, and theoretically high levels of dopaminergic activity. The trait components have high heritabilities for a personality trait.

A comparison of three structural models for personality: The Big Three, the Big Five, and the Alternative Five.

The major factors from 3 models of personality are compared: Eysenck's Three Factor model, Costa and McCrae's version of the Big Five, and Zuckerman and Kuhlman's Alternative Five. The 1st study describes the development of a questionnaire measure for the Alternative Five and the reliability assessments of the scales. The 2nd study used factor analysis to compare the factors among the scales from the 3 models. Extraversion and Neuroticism were quite similar across all 3 models. Eysenck's Psychoticism scale marked a factor that included Conscientiousness and Impulsive Sensation Seeking factors from the other 2 models. Agreeableness and Aggression-Hostility formed a 4th factor. Openness could be identified as a factor using facet scales, but it showed no convergence with other factors. Four of the five factors showed convergence across at least 2 of the models.

What is a basic factor and which factors are basic? Turtles all the way down

Criteria for a “basic factor” of personality include: (1) reliable identification of the dimension factor across methods, genders, ages; (2) at least moderate heritability; (3) identification of similar kinds of behavioral traits in non-human species; and (4) association of the trait biological trait markers. The conventional five factor model has not gone far beyond the first of these. An alternative five factor model has been developed from factor analyses of traits selected from psychobiological studies of personality; it includes the basic factors of sociability, neuroticism-anxiety, impulsive unsocialized sensation seeking, aggression-hostility and activity. Universal factors are likely to have biological bases. Personality traits must be studied at all biological levels from the behavioral to the genetic.

Clinical Characteristics of Female Alcoholics with Low Platelet Monoamine Oxidase Activity

The aim of the present study was to see if female alcoholics had low platelet MAO activity and whether there was a correlation between low MAO activity in female alcoholics and specific clinical characteristics often observed in type II male alcoholics. In earlier studies, male alcoholics have been subdivided into type I and type II alcoholics. Type II alcoholics were characterized by early onset, a high frequency of depression and alcoholism in first degree relatives, a high frequency of drug abuse and social complications, sensation seeking behavior, extraversion, impulsive sensation seeking psychopathy, and low platelet MAO activity. In the present series it was demonstrated that the female alcoholics had significantly lower platelet MAO activities than the female healthy volunteers. The subgroup of female alcoholics with low platelet MAO activity, however, did not differ from female alcoholics with normal platelet MAO activity in the same way as male alcoholics with low platelet MAO activity have been shown to differ from male alcoholics with normal platelet activity. They did not have early onset, higher frequency of depression or alcoholism in their first degree relatives, nor more social complications than the female alcoholics with normal platelet MAO activity. Furthermore, they did not differ from the female alcoholics with normal platelet MAO activity in any personality trait covered by the Karolinska Scales of Personality (KSP).