scholarly journals Are Changes in Personality Traits and Alcohol Use Associated? A Cohort Study Among Young Swiss Men

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerhard Gmel ◽  
Simon Marmet ◽  
Joseph Studer ◽  
Matthias Wicki

Objective: It is well known that certain personality traits are associated with alcohol use. Because less is known about it, we wished to investigate whether changes in alcohol use were longitudinally associated with changes in personality and in which direction the influence or causation might flow.Methods: Data came from the self-reported questionnaire answers of 5,125 young men at two time points during the Cohort study on Substance Use Risk Factors (C-SURF). Their average ages were 20.0 and 25.4 years old at the first and second wave assessments, respectively. Four personality traits were measured: (a) aggression–hostility; (b) sociability; (c) neuroticism–anxiety; and (d) sensation seeking. Alcohol use was measured by volume (drinks per week) and binge drinking (about 60+ grams per occasion). Cross-lagged panel models and two-wave latent change score models were used.Results: Aggression–hostility, sensation seeking, and sociability were significantly and positively cross-sectionally associated with both alcohol use variables. Drinking volume and these three personality traits bidirectionally predicted each other. Binge drinking was bidirectionally associated with sensation-seeking only, whereas aggression–hostility and sociability only predicted binge drinking, but not vice versa. Changes in alcohol use were significantly positively associated with changes in aggression–hostility, sensation seeking, and sociability. Associations reached small Cohen's effect sizes for sociability and sensation seeking, but not for aggression–hostility. Associations with neuroticism–anxiety were mostly not significant.Conclusion: The direction of effects confirmed findings from other studies, and the association between changes in personality and alcohol use support the idea that prevention programs should simultaneously target both.

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
morgane guillou-landreat ◽  
Elkhan Tahmazov ◽  
Schreck Benoit ◽  
Marie Grall-bronnec ◽  
Patricia Conrod ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Alcohol use is a major public health challenge in France, where at the age of 17 half the young people report an episode of severe alcohol intoxication in the month preceding the survey. Numerous prevention programmes have a general objective, but in adolescence individual vulnerabilities towards addictions differ significantly with personality traits. Prevention targeting personality traits enables work on risk factors for addictive behaviours, and has shown genuine efficacy. Among existing programmes, PREVENTURE has shown an effect on the reduction in alcohol consumption by targeting four personality traits: impulsivity, sensation-seeking, negative thoughts and anxiety. This programme has been tested on samples recruited in adolescent populations in school environments, identifying adolescents at risk, but it has not been tested on a more targeted recruitment of adolescents seen in consultation. Methods The main hypothesis of this study is that the targeted prevention programme PREVENTURE will have an impact on the prevalence of binge-drinking episodes. The secondary hypotheses explore other factors such as associated substance use, anxiety and depression, as well as the acceptability of the programme. This article presents the study protocol of “PREVADO” study. We intend to assess the impact of the targeted intervention programme PREVENTURE on the prevalence of binge-drinking episodes among adolescents aged 14 to 17 years consulting in one of the participating centres or referred by a school doctor. The study will be prospective, randomised, controlled and open-label, and will comprise an intervention group and a control group. The adolescents will then be followed and assessed 1, 3, 6 and 12 months after the intervention. The study needs to include 700 subjects in order to reach 340 adolescents randomised, 170 in each group. It will concern 33 centres. Discussion This project could favour the targeting of addictive behaviours among vulnerable adolescents, and its application on a larger scale could be envisaged. Trial registration The Trial registration number is NCT04599270, and it was registered on the ClinicalTrials.gov public website.


2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-164
Author(s):  
Ishaq Malik ◽  
Elaine Toombs ◽  
Aislin R. Mushquash ◽  
Daniel S. McGrath ◽  
Christopher J. Mushquash

Alcohol use is common among individuals attending university and frequent use is associated with several negative effects. It is therefore important to assess individual difference factors preceding alcohol use. Materialism, a value one holds that prioritizes status through the acquisition of money and possessions, has received minimal research focus in relation to alcohol use and has predominantly been examined using cross-sectional designs (i.e., data collected at one time point). The present study was the first to test the association between materialism, risky drinking motives (i.e., motives preceding alcohol use associated with increased consumption and related problems), and risky personality traits (i.e., stable characteristics associated with frequent substance use and related problems) using a short-term longitudinal design. Undergraduate student drinkers (N = 317) completed self-report questionnaires at baseline and follow-up (2 weeks later). Hierarchical regression analyses found that greater levels of materialism significantly predicted each drinking motive while controlling for risky personality traits. Materialism significantly predicted drinking to cope with depression when controlling for trait hopelessness (β = .16, p = .014), drinking to cope with anxiety while controlling for anxiety sensitivity (β = .11, p = .024), and drinking for enhancement while controlling for sensation seeking (β = .24, p < .001). Results provide evidence that materialism is associated with risky drinking motives, which may inform prevention and treatment efforts for problematic use among undergraduate students.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liam Satchell ◽  
Henry Johnson ◽  
Charlotte A. Hudson ◽  
Craig Harper

Background: The relationship between psychopathic personality and problematic alcohol consumption could be important for understanding risk and potential interventions. This existing work on psychopathy and alcohol abuse is typically conducted in criminal and hospitalised populations and little attention has been paid to investigating the general populations’ psychopathic personality and problematic consumption of alcohol. The psychopathy-focused Triarchic Psychopathy Measure (TriPM) and the more general Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory of personality (RST) focus on individual differences related to low self-control and sensation seeking, and could relate to problematic alcohol consumption in non-forensic samples. The current study brings together RST and psychopathic personality traits to predict alcohol use disorders. We hypothesise that impulsivity and anxiety predict problematic alcohol consumption and related risk appraisal.Methods: We analysed data from a sample of 349 general population participants who had completed measures of the TriPM, RST, alcohol use disorders (AUDIT) and their perceived negative outcomes of high risk behaviour with the Cognitive Appraisal of Risky Events (CARE) measure.Results: We find some evidence that TriPM’s disinhibition and RST’s anxious personality traits relate to AUDIT scores. We find limited evidence that personality traits predict the negative appraisal of risky events, but alcohol use was related to increased perceptions of the negative outcomes of alcohol consumption.Conclusions: Overall this study shows that individual differences do relate to problematic alcohol consumption but not the appraisal of risks related to alcohol consumption. This has implications for the structuring of intervention for those at risk of problematic consumption of alcohol.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah A Griffin ◽  
Timothy J Trull

Objectives: Using Ecological Momentary Assessment methods (EMA) we aimed to investigate the influence of trait and state (momentary) impulsivity on alcohol use behaviors in daily life. Facets of the UPPS trait model of impulsivity (Whiteside and Lynam, 2001) have been found to differentially relate to alcohol-related outcomes and behaviors in cross-sectional and longitudinal studies. The present work expands on this by assessing UPPS facets in daily life and examining the contributions of trait and state impulsivity facets to daily life drinking behavior. Methods: 49 participants were prompted at least six times per day for 21 days. A total of 4,548 collected EMA reports were included in analyses. Multi-level models were computed predicting daily life alcohol use behaviors from state and trait impulsivity facets and relevant covariates. Results: Individual facets of momentary impulsivity differentially related to alcohol outcomes, such that (lack of) premeditation and, to a lesser extent, sensation seeking showed unique patterns of association with drinking and drinking quantity. Only trait levels of (lack of) premeditation were related to drinking behavior in daily life; no other trait UPPS scale significantly related to alcohol use. Conclusions: These results highlight state difficulties with premeditation as particularly relevant to drinking behavior in daily life. Our results also support the incremental validity of state impulsivity facets over trait level measures in relation to drinking behavior in daily life. These findings offer important insight into the phenomenology of daily-life alcohol use and highlight possible avenues for intervention and prevention efforts. Public Health Statement: Momentary fluctuations in premeditation predict alcohol use in daily life. Treatments targeting planning or forethought in relation to alcohol use may interrupt this process contributing to daily life drinking behaviors.


Author(s):  
Kenneth J. Sher ◽  
Andrew Littlefield ◽  
Matthew Lee

This chapter discusses relations between personality and alcohol use disorder (AUD). After reviewing basic terms and concepts in personality research, two major areas of contemporary research are discussed. The first area concerns how personality traits are implicated in etiologic pathways to AUD. This highlights the centrality of personality to conceptualizing AUD and related psychopathology. The second area is research emphasizing movement beyond a static view of personality, recognizing that personality traits are dynamic and change as a function of human development and life transitions. In particular, whereas past research on “maturing out” of AUD emphasized salutary effects of young adult role transitions, recent evidence reveals normative patterns of developmental personality maturation and supports these as additional influences on maturing out. The chapter discusses ways that contextual role effects and personality maturation can perhaps be integrated into a broader model of maturing out of AUD. Implications for future investigation are presented.


Author(s):  
Yubing Zheng ◽  
Yang Ma ◽  
Nan Li ◽  
Jianchuan Cheng

In recent years, the increasing rate of road crashes involving cyclists with a disproportionate overrepresentation in injury statistics has become a major concern in road safety and public health. However, much remains unknown about factors contributing to cyclists’ high crash rates, especially those related to personal characteristics. This study aims to explore the influence of cyclist personality traits and cycling behaviors on their road safety outcomes using a mediated model combining these constructs. A total of 628 cyclists completed an online questionnaire consisting of questions related to cycling anger, impulsiveness, normlessness, sensation seeking, risky cycling behaviors, and involvement in crash-related conditions in the past year. After the psychometric properties of the employed scales were examined, the relationships among the tested constructs were investigated using structural equation modeling. The results showed that cyclists’ crash risks were directly predicted by risky cycling behaviors and cycling anger, and the effects of cycling anger, impulsiveness, as well as normlessness on crash risks, were mediated by cycling behaviors. The current findings provide insight into the importance of personality traits in impacting cycling safety and could facilitate the development of evidence-based prevention and promotion strategies targeting cyclists in China.


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