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One of the side effects of ADHD is being impulsive. Some common tips mentioned for people to fight their urges is practicing mindfulness and joining support groups. One piece of advice that took me by surprise was being consciously aware of oneself. I found this to be interesting because it correlates with what Bricker said about finding self control to stop one's impulsive urges. "When you notice an urge, name it in your mind. For instance, “here is anger and wanting to criticize my spouse,” she said"

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Impulsiveness is a common trait seen in people with Borderline personality disorders. It was interesting to see that disorders like Bi-Polar depression were not strongly associated with being impulsive. One mistake that people make with type of disorder is that they associate it with being compulsive. However, "Impulsivity should not be confused with a compulsion, in which a person recognizes the behavior is abnormal but cannot stop it. With impulsivity, the person will act out without inherently recognizing that the behavior is abnormal."

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If you have borderline personality disorder (BPD), you may find yourself struggling to manage impulsive behaviors. From making hasty decisions to getting into fights, impulsivity can cause harm to yourself and those around you. In addition to undermining relationships and your overall sense of well-being, impulsive behaviors can also lead to financial and legal harm if left unchecked.

Fortunately, there are treatments that can help bring impulsivity under control, including psychotherapy, mindfulness training. and pharmaceutical drugs.

Understanding Impulsivity

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), impulsive behaviors are a hallmark of BPD. Impulsivity is broadly defined as actions without foresight that are poorly conceived, prematurely expressed, unnecessarily risky, and inappropriate to the situation. Impulsivity is associated with undesirable, rather than desirable, outcomes.﻿﻿

People who are impulsive are commonly described as being rash, hot-headed, unpredictable, or unstable. It is, in fact, the instability that best characterizes BPD as a disorder.

People with BPD typically suffer from feelings of inadequacy that manifest with unstable emotions, unstable behaviors, and unstable relationships. They are quick to lash out at anything considered a slight and will often fail to recognize how those emotions are unreasonable or excessive.

In psychological terms, impulsive behaviors are inherently inappropriate either in terms of scale or potential risk. A person with BPD is less likely to take into account potential consequences and will often turn to self-harm behaviors (like binge eating or excessive drinking) as a means to cope.

However, impulsive behaviors are not, in and of themselves, diagnostic of BPD. It only when the behavior is pervasive, detrimental, and interferes with a person's ability to function normally that BPD may be considered.﻿﻿

﻿Impulsivity should not be confused with a compulsion, in which a person recognizes the behavior is abnormal but cannot stop it. With impulsivity, the person will act out without inherently recognizing that the behavior is abnormal.

There are many different types of behavior that can become impulsive with BPD; each situation is different. There are, however, themes and scenarios that are common among people with BPD:

Oversharing of emotions

Overspending

Over-apologizing

Quitting a job suddenly

Frequent emotional outbursts

Meaningless or risky sex

Joining and quitting a lot of groups

Jumping to conclusions

Clearing out belongings to "start anew"

Constantly "turning over a new leaf"

Abruptly changing or canceling plans

Inability to receive criticism without affront

Binge eating or drinking

Threatening to harm others

Self-harm

Self-mutilation

Destroying property

Escalating confrontations

Physical violence

Studies into behaviors in twins have suggested that genetics may play a larger role in BPD than imagined. It is believed that a genetic error on chromosome 9 may be linked to features of BPD, including the partial inheritability of impulsive aggression.﻿﻿

Mutations like these may alter the otherwise normal production of serotonin and dopamine, the neurotransmitters associated with mood and cognition. In people with BPD, impulsivity may also be closely tied to dopamine receptors on the brain itself, according to research from Vanderbilt University.﻿﻿

If these receptors are impaired, particularly on the frontal lobe of the brain where logical decisions are made, a person may have less capacity to "think things through" before acting.

It is this combination of environmental, genetic, and physiological factors that likely create the perfect storm for the development of BPD and BPD-associated impulsivity.

No single test can confirm whether your impulsive behavior is the result of BPD or some other condition. If BPD is suspected, a doctor will perform a psychological exam to determine whether the body of symptoms are consistent with BPD as outlined in the DSM-5.

To this end, a person must meet the two major diagnostic criteria for the disorder:

1. An impairment of personality functioning, either in terms of poor self-image and self-criticism or instability of goals, aspirations, values, or career plans

2. An impairment of interpersonal functioning, either in terms of a lack of empathy (due to negative attitudes and hypersensitivity) or the inability to sustain intimacy (due to mistrust, neediness, or the fear of abandonment)

Both criteria must be met to be diagnosed with BPD. It is a complicated process requiring clinical expertise and one that is prone to misdiagnosis. To avoid this, all other possible causes must be explored and excluded, both psychological and physical.﻿﻿

Differential Diagnoses

Impulsive behaviors are not exclusive to BPD. They are also associated with bipolar mania, often in tandem with grandiosity and a flight of ideas. During an acute manic episode, a person will often act impulsivity with little thought of the consequence. Spending sprees and hypersexual behaviors are two common examples of impulsivity related to bipolar disorder (BD).﻿﻿

Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) is closely aligned with BPD but differs in that there is a pervasive and persistent disregard for morals, social norms, and the rights and feelings of others.

With borderline personality disorder, a person will have extreme emotions that they find hard to control. With antisocial personality disorder, there will be a marked lack of emotions.

While impulsive behaviors can be severe and pervasive, these symptoms can often be successfully managed with treatment. Many treatments for BPD have components that specifically target impulsivity.

There are a number of drugs that specifically treat impulsive behaviors. Among the atypical antipsychotics, Abilify (aripiprazole) is seen to reduce interpersonal problems and impulsivity. Among the mood stabilizers, Lamictal (lamotrigine) may help reduce impulsivity and anger, while Topamax (topiramate) may ameliorate impulsivity, anger, and anxiety.﻿﻿

Medications are most effective when used in conjunction with psychotherapy with a therapist who specializes in BPD.

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How Acting Without Foresight Is Characteristic of BPD

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If you have borderline personality disorder (BPD), you may find yourself struggling to manage impulsive behaviors. From making hasty decisions to getting into fights, impulsivity can cause harm to yourself and those around you. In addition to undermining relationships and your overall sense of well-being, impulsive behaviors can also lead to financial and legal harm if left unchecked.

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Felicia Perez is a psychology professor at Diablo Valley College, Pleasant Hill. She discussed how both genetics and one's environment play a role in leading one to be more impulsive than others. She backed up the academic journal article "

Measuring Impulsivity in Daily Life: The Momentary Impulsivity Scale" that the personality trait theory is a major indicator towards one being impulsive. One's personality is a product of their environment. She also mentioned certain chemicals like Dopamine having higher arousal rates than others leading genetics to be a factor in impulsiveness too.

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This essay goes over three components that are to blame for individuals being impulsive: nature, nurture, and the brain's anatomy. Both genetics and one's environment take on a collective effort to allow one to be more of a risk taker than others. Some genes within the brain stay dormant, until the environment around oneself triggers it. "However, he also ended up finding that he himself tested positive for the “warrior” gene type and had a lineage of serial killer ancestors. The only reason he did not act upon his nature was because of his environment with a loving family".

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Bricker believes that it is important to be consciously aware of the choices one makes every day in order to break down bad habits like smoking or other impulsive urges. It is natural to assume that it is the brain's fault for one's need to engage in risky behaviour. However, people forget that sometimes one has a conscious side too. It is important to use it in order to gain self control. "epidemic of unhealthy living...we engage in risky behaviors due to genetics and..."

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The secret to self control | Jonathan Bricker | TEDxRainier

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The Momentary Impulsive scale was created to calculate one's propensity to be impulsive, specifically people with Borderline personality disorder and Depressive disorder. The 4 factor personality theory is the reason behind one's impulsivity: lack of perseverance, lack of premeditation, negative urgency, and sensation seeking. Sensation seeking seems to be a probable cause for young adults to be impulsive since the other scholarly article on premeditation confirmed it too. Sensation seeking is connected with the reward center of the brain."The factors mapped on to (a) negative urgency, defined as the tendency to act rashly when experiencing negative affect; (b) lack of premeditation, which is conceptually similar to nonplanning impulsivity; (c) lack of perseverance, or a tendency to abandon goal-directed behaviors; and (d) sensation seeking, defined as a preference for intense, novel, or risky experiences".

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Abstract

Impulsivity is a core feature of many psychiatric disorders. Traditionally, impulsivity has been assessed using retrospective questionnaires or laboratory tasks. Both approaches neglect intraindividual variability in impulsivity and do not capture impulsivity as it occurs in real-world settings. The goal of the current study was to provide a method for assessing impulsivity in daily life that provides both between-individual and within-individual information. Participants with borderline personality disorder (BPD; n = 67) or a depressive disorder (DD; n = 38) carried an electronic diary for 28 days and responded to 9 impulsivity items up to 6 times per day. Item distributions and iterative exploratory factor analysis (EFA) results were examined to select the items that best captured momentary impulsivity. A brief 4-item scale was created that can be used for the assessment of momentary impulsivity. Model fit was good for both within- and between-individual EFA. As expected, the BPD group showed significantly higher scores on our Momentary Impulsivity Scale than the DD group, and the resulting scale was moderately correlated with common trait impulsivity scales.

Keywords: ambulatory assessment, ecological momentary assessment, impulsivity, borderline personality disorder, scale development

The construct of impulsivity can be broadly summarized as the "tendency to act spontaneously and without deliberation" ( Carver, 2005, p. 313). Typically, investigators examine impulsivity at the trait level, thus classifying an individual's propensity for impulsivity. This trait-level measurement assumes impulsivity is a stable construct and neglects variability in impulsivity across time. Evidence suggests, however, that trait constructs such as impulsivity show considerable intraindividual variability and that this variability is at least partially a result of situational factors ( Fleeson, 2007). The goal of the current study was to create a momentary impulsivity scale (MIS) that can be administered multiple times per day over a period of consecutive days in experience sampling or ecological momentary assessment studies. Such a scale can provide information about the variability of impulsivity over time and open up future lines of research, such as the examination of potential antecedents (e.g., time of day, presence of stressors, mood, nutrition, amount of sleep, medication) and consequences (e.g., interpersonal conflict, change in mood, health-related concerns) of impulsivity.

Traditional Assessment of Impulsivity

Impulsivity is best conceptualized as a broad, multifaceted construct (e.g., Evenden, 1999). Given the broad nature of the construct, existing research has conceptualized impulsivity in a number of related, but distinct ways. For example, the term impulsivity has been used to refer to behavior that occurs prior to full evaluation of a situation, an inability to inhibit responding, or a preference for immediate gratification ( Evenden, 1999).

Given the construct's multifaceted nature, a number of efforts have been made to decompose impulsivity into several lower order factors. These attempts have produced a number of different solutions, typically resulting in two to four lower order impulsivity factors. For example, Patton, Stanford, and Barratt (1995) found evidence in favor of separate inattentive, motor, and nonplanning factors of impulsivity using their measure, the Barratt Impulsiveness ScaleVersion 11 (BIS-11). Their initial factor structure has not garnered substantial empirical replication, however (e.g., Haden & Shiva, 2008; Reise, Moore, Sabb, Brown, & London, 2013; Steinberg, Sharp, Stanford, & Tharp, 2013). Other investigators have found that responses to the BIS-11 better fit a two-factor solution reflecting cognitive and behavioral aspects of impulsivity ( Reise et al., 2013).

Using personality trait theory to derive a measure of impulsivity, Whiteside and Lynam (2001) found support for a four-factor model of impulsive personality traits. The factors mapped on to (a) negative urgency, defined as the tendency to act rashly when experiencing negative affect; (b) lack of premeditation, which is conceptually similar to nonplanning impulsivity; (c) lack of perseverance, or a tendency to abandon goal-directed behaviors; and (d) sensation seeking, defined as a preference for intense, novel, or risky experiences ( Whiteside & Lynam, 2001).

Despite differences in these factor structures, these traditional models of impulsivity assessment are similar in that impulsivity is conceptualized as a relatively stable personality trait that can be assessed via retrospective self-report questionnaires. These trait models are helpful in identifying individuals who are predisposed to negative outcomes associated with impulsivity. The question of when predisposed individuals will experience impulsivity or behave impulsively, however, is perhaps more clinically relevant. To address this question, it is necessary to study how impulsivity is experienced in the moment and in individuals' daily lives.

Laboratory-based behavioral tasks have been used to study specific states of impulsivity at the micro-behavioral level (e.g., Dougherty, Mathias, Marsh, & Jagar, 2005). One advantage of these laboratory-based assessments is that they can provide "behavioral snap shots of what the individual would actually do in a situation" ( Cyders & Coskunpinar, 2011, p. 967). These behavioral assessments are difficult to obtain in naturalistic settings, however. Thus, an alternative approach is to develop a self-report measure of state impulsivity that can be used in naturalistic settings.

Ecological Momentary Assessment of Impulsivity

Ecological momentary assessment (EMA; Stone & Shiffman, 1994) is a term used to describe frequent, repeated assessments that occur within participants' natural environments. EMA is a useful tool for measuring dynamic constructs, such as mood or impulsivity, during participants' daily lives. In this way, EMA can provide information about the contexts in which impulsivity occurs, inter- and intravariability of impulsivity, and change in impulsivity over time, making it particularly well suited for the assessment of this construct.

A number of EMA studies have included questionnaire assessments of trait impulsivity while investigating areas as diverse as bulimia ( Engel et al., 2007; Myers et al., 2006; Steiger, Lehoux, & Gauvin, 1999), personality ( Miller, Vachon, & Lynam, 2009), alcohol use ( Simons, Dvorak, Batien, & Wray, 2010; Simons, Gaher, Oliver, Bush, & Palmer, 2005), and sexual intercourse in depressed adolescents ( Shrier et al., 2012). Few studies, however, have examined the construct at the momentary level. Of the few EMA studies (or, daily survey studies) that have, all focused solely on specific behaviors associated with impulsivity (e.g., Coifman, Berenson, Rafaeli, & Downey, 2012; Epstein, 1979; Sharma, Kohl, Morgan, & Clark, 2013; Wu & Clark, 2003). This purely behavioral measurement helps demonstrate the relationship between trait impulsivity and problematic behaviors. There are a number of complications with this approach, however.

First, impulsive behaviors may occur only infrequently and may be difficult to capture over the course of just a few weeks of evaluation. For example, Sharma and colleagues (2013) distinguished between less frequent behaviors associated with impulsivity (e.g., number of speeding tickets, number of different sex partners) and daily behaviors associated with impulsivity (e.g., skipped class on a whim, did not read instructions before starting something) among college students.

Second, although behaviors such as binge eating, excessive spending, and alcohol use may occur impulsively on some occasions, individuals may also engage in these behaviors in a nonimpulsive manner. Aspects of impulsivity such as recklessness, lack of planning or perseverance, and inattentiveness, which may be used to determine whether a behavior is impulsive or nonimpulsive, are not captured in a pure behavioral approach. Although most researchers make a distinction between impulsivity and associated behaviors (see Sharma et al., 2013), some assessments equate these constructs (e.g., Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, text revision [ DSMIVTR] impulsivity criterion of borderline personality disorder; American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2000). A broader and more general assessment of impulsivity as experienced in daily life, using EMA, is therefore needed to differentiate between impulsive and nonimpulsive manifestations of externalizing behaviors as they unfold in the real world.

The Current Study

The purpose of the current study was to develop a brief, reliable, and valid psychometrically sound scale that can be used in EMA studies as a measure of momentary impulsivity, particularly within clinical samples. We attempted to develop such a scale that adequately measured both inter- and intraindividual differences in impulsivity while maintaining brevity, in order to avoid overburdening research participants. First, we used within-person and between-person factor analyses to inform scale construction, and then we examined the reliability of the final scale scores across and within individuals. Next, we assessed the association between scale scores and several popular trait measures of impulsivity to provide construct and convergent validity.

The initial scale was constructed using a clinical sample of individuals diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD). The link between BPD and impulsivity is well established, particularly using trait self-report measures (e.g., Bornovalova, Lejuez, Daughters, Rosenthal, & Lynch, 2005; Coffey, Schumacher, Baschnagel, Hawk, & Holloman, 2011; Crowell, Beauchaine, & Linehan, 2009; Ferraz et al., 2009; Hochhausen, Lorenz, & Newman, 2002; Links, Heslegrave, & van Reekum, 1999; McCloskey et al., 2009; Tragesser & Robinson, 2009; Whiteside, Lynam, Miller, & Reynolds, 2005; Zanarini, 1993), yet few empirical studies have examined proximal correlates of impulsivity in BPD (except see Coifman et al., 2012). By definition, difficulties associated with a BPD diagnosis extend beyond problems with impulsivity. Specifically, BPD is also characterized by emotion dysregulation, anger, and problematic relationships ( APA, 2000). To ensure that our scale is capturing impulsivity specifically, rather than other difficulties in BPD that are correlated with impulsivity, we used a depressive disorder (DD) (i.e., major depressive disorder or dysthymia) control group. Impulsivity is not considered to be a major characteristic of depression; however, BPD and DD are similar in that they are both characterized by high levels of negative affect ( Cheavens & Heiy, 2011) and interpersonal difficulties (e.g., Joiner, 2000; Nezlek, Hampton, & Shean, 2000; Scott, Levy, & Pincus, 2009; Selby, Braithwaite, Joiner, & Fincham, 2008; Stepp, Pilkonis, Yaggi, Morse, & Feske, 2009). Therefore, differences between groups on our momentary impulsivity scale cannot be attributed to general difficulties in functioning.

In service of these goals, we expected the BPD group to score higher on the resulting momentary impulsivity scale than the depressed group. Additionally, we expected our final scale to correlate only moderately with traditional self-report measures of impulsivity (i.e., UPPS Impulsive Behavior Scale, Whiteside & Lynam, 2001; BIS-11, Patton et al., 1995) given that it was designed to assess impulsivity as experienced in the moment, rather than trait impulsivity. The average correlation between trait self-report measures and laboratory-based measures (often assumed to be a state measure) of impulsivity is r = .10 ( Cyders & Coskunpinar, 2011). We expected the correlations between trait self-report measures and our final scale to exceed this correlation, given that both use self-report.

Method

Participants

Participants were recruited for a larger study examining affective instability in BPD, and previous results focusing on affect and affective instability are published elsewhere (see Jahng et al., 2011, Jahng, Wood, & Trull, 2008; Solhan, Trull, Jahng, & Wood, 2009; Trull et al., 2008). Participants were outpatients at one of four local clinics serving the university and/or the general community. To be included in this larger study, participants were required to be between the ages of 18 and 65 and to meet DSMIVTR criteria for BPD, including the specific affective instability criterion, or to meet criteria for a current DSMIVTR DD (i.e., major depression, dysthymia; APA, 2000) and not BPD. General exclusion criteria included psychosis, mental retardation, severe neurological dysfunction, or history of head trauma that affected mood or concentration. Structured Clinical Interview for DSMIV Axis I Disorders (SCID-I; First, Spitzer, Gibbons, & Williams, 1995) and the Structured Interview for DSMIV Personality (SIDP-IV; Pfohl, Blum, & Zimmerman, 1994) were used to establish eligibility for this study. The SIDP-IV protocol requires interviewers to rate each PD criterion (including the BPD impulsivity criterion) as 0 = absent, 1 = subthreshold, 2 = present, or 3 = extreme. Diagnostic interrater reliability was computed for a subset of participants ( n = 20). A second interviewer listened to an audio recording of the SCID-I and SIDP-IV interviews and independently arrived at ratings and diagnoses. Our interviewers had excellent agreement on the presence or absence of affective instability (κ = 1.0), diagnosis of BPD (κ =.90), and diagnosis of a current depressive disorder (κ = 1.0).

An early phase of data collection used a binary response format for the momentary impulsivity items of interest. Thus, analyses for the current article are limited to the 105 individuals who were given the Likert scale response format. Mean age was 34.8 years ( SD = 12.6) for the DD group and 31.6 years ( SD = 11.9) for the BPD group. The sample was predominantly female (89.5%), White (84.8%), and had annual family incomes of less than $25,000 (71.4%). The majority of participants had current (past 12 months) diagnoses of anxiety disorder (73.5%) and mood disorder (76.7%). Demographics and comorbid Axis I diagnoses are shown by group in .

Table 1

Procedure and Measures

Participants were issued an electronic diary (ED; Palm Zire 31 ® handheld computer) they carried for 28 days. The ED sounded an alarm six times per day, prompting the individual to answer questions about current mood, behavior, and environment. The alarm times were determined by a software program that stratified the participants' usual waking hours (as reported by the participant prior to the study start) into six equal intervals, and then randomly selected a time within each interval (see Trull et al., 2008, for more details regarding the ED protocol). On average, participants were prompted 168 times over the course of the 28-day period. Compliance rates for this sample were very high (approximately 90%) and did not differ by diagnostic group (see Jahng et al., 2011; Trull et al., 2008). Following the 28-day EMA protocol, participants completed a battery of traditional retrospective self-report questionnaires, including the BIS-11 and the UPPS, which are described below.

The BIS-11 is a 30-item self-report questionnaire that assesses general impulsivity and sub-facets of impulsivity (i.e., attention, nonplanning, motor) using a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ( rarely/never) to 4 ( almost always/always). Participants in our sample reported on a 03 scale. However, in order to be able to directly compare these results with the normative data presented by Patton and colleagues (1995), the data were converted to a 14 scale. The 1-month testretest reliability of total BIS-11 scores in this sample was .81 (BPD r = .78; DD r = .84).

The UPPS is a 45-item self-report questionnaire based on a four-factor model of personality traits thought to be associated with behavioral patterns of impulsivity. The factors consist of urgency, lack of premeditation, lack of perseverance, and sensation seeking. Each factor is assessed with 1012 items specific to that factor. Participants respond using a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ( strongly disagree) to 4 ( strongly agree). Although results are generally interpreted at the subscale level, a total UPPS score was also computed. The 1-month testretest reliability of total UPPS scores in this sample was .87 (BPD r = .85; DD r = .89).

The MIS

Items from the BIS-11 and from the SIDP-IV impulsivity criterion of BPD were examined and adapted to reflect momentary aspects of impulsivity. We nominated items that reflected both behavioral and internal aspects of impulsivity to avoid developing a scale that consisted only of specific impulsive behaviors. In order to reduce participant burden, only a limited number of items were administered. Specifically, the nine items shown in were designated as potential items assessing momentary impulsivity for an EMA protocol. Although a single factor would be preferable, it seemed possible that behavioral and cognitively based items might load on two separate factors. Fabrigar, Wegener, MacCallum, and Strahan (1999) recommend the number of variables used should be at least 35 times the number of expected factors. Thus, the number of initial items was adequate for our hypothesized model.

Although it is traditionally recommended that initial item testing be overly inclusive (see Clark & Watson, 1995), specific considerations are necessary for EMA measures (see Barta, Tennen, & Litt, 2012). First, reactivity to self-monitoring is reduced when a number of different behaviors or constructs are monitored. Second, time-consuming or burdensome EMA protocols are likely to decrease the amount of effort participants will dedicate to the study protocol (affecting compliance). Thus, the nine items shown in were carefully selected in order to broadly capture the construct of impulsivity. For example, items putatively representing motor (e.g., "I acted on impulse, without caring what might happen"), nonplanning (e.g., "I said things without thinking"), and inattention (e.g., "I felt bored with what I was doing") impulsivity were included for evaluation. At each prompt, participants rated these nine impulsivity items. Participants responded using a 5-point Likert scale (1 = very slightly or not at all; 2 = a little; 3 = moderately; 4 = quite a bit; 5 = extremely) describing how much each statement described their experience since the last completed prompt. These instructions were provided to focus on recent cognitions, experiences, and behaviors related to impulsivity.

Data Analysis

EMA data are nested within individuals requiring factor analysis based on both inter- and intraindividual covariance between items. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA), using iterated principal factor analysis, was conducted first using within-person covariance matrices. Factor analysis was conducted using weighted least squares mean and variance adjusted estimation in Mplus Version 6.12 ( Muthén & Muthén, 2010). Data were then averaged across person for each item. For example, participants' responses to the item, "I said things without thinking," at each measurement occasion were summed and divided by the number of total measurement occasions. These aggregated data (average item score across the study, for each person) were then factor analyzed to provide between-individual information.

Basic descriptive statistics of the resulting scale were examined. Given that this scale is designed to capture variability and instability across time and context, an average of daily mean squared successive difference (MSSD) was computed. The MSSD takes into account temporal dependency, as well as variability ( Jahng et al., 2008). As its name implies, the MSSD is the average of the squared difference between successive observations ( x) at occasions i + 1 and i. The MSSD for a time series of n measurement occasions is given by Equation 1:

We adjusted for unequal time intervals (due to the random scheduling of prompts) in the computation of MSSD using a method suggested by Jahng et al. (2008).

Using an approach described by Shrout and Lane (2012), both within- and between-individual reliability for the resulting scale scores were computed. Specifically, reliability coefficients were obtained by first computing variance component estimates using analysis of variance. Then, these variance components were used to provide reliability estimates based on generalizability theory. It is important to note that within-individual and between-individual reliability have different interpretations for intensive longitudinal designs, like those for experience sampling or EMA studies. High within-individual reliability is indicative of high consistency between items within individuals. In the current study, maximizing within-individual reliability would narrow the construct of interest, given that impulsivity is broad. High between-individual reliability is indicative of high consistency of item responses over time and across all individuals. Finally, the correlations between the final MIS and self-report questionnaires were calculated in order to provide initial evidence of convergent validity for these scale scores.

Results

After examination of distributions, within-person interitem correlations, and the results of preliminary factor analysis of nested data, four of the nine initial items were dropped. Specifically, Items 1, 8, and 9 (shown in ) were eliminated due to low rates of endorsement (highly positively skewed), and Item 3 was dropped because it correlated highly with Items 2 and 7 ( r = .82 for both pairs). After removal of those items, an EFA (with Geomin rotation) was conducted using the remaining items. In the between-individual EFA, Item 5 loaded on its own factor and was not highly correlated with the first factor ( r = .15). Consequently, this item was removed from the analysis, and an EFA was conducted on the remaining four items.

Both between- (root-mean-square error of approximation [RMSEA] < 0.01; comparative fit index [CFI] = 1.0; Tucker-Lewis Index [TLI] = 1.0) and within- (RMSEA = 0.023; CFI = 0.988; TLI = 0.964) individual EFA on the remaining four items suggested a one-factor solution that provided good model fit. Eigenvalues of between- and within- individual covariances were 2.69, 0.68, 0.49, and 0.15, and 2.52, 0.71, 0.54, and 0.23, respectively. Standardized item factor loadings ranged from .57 to .93 for the between-individual factor solution and from 0.55 to 0.89 for the within-individual factor solution. As shown in , between-individual correlations for the final four items (below diagonal) are comparable to within-individual (above diagonal) correlations, overall. Final factor loadings of the remaining four items from the one-factor solution for the between-individual EFA and for the within-individual EFA, respectively, were "I said things without thinking" (.928, .843); "I spent more money than I meant to" (.591, .546); "I have felt impatient" (.568, .573); and "I made a 'spur of the moment' decision" (.918, .893).

Table 3

MIS scores were averaged across all observations for an individual in order to create the individual's mean MIS score over the 28-day period. The means and standard deviations of the MIS scores for our sample are shown in the lower panel of . The BPD group had a mean scale score of 6.20 ( SD = 1.62), and the DD group had a mean of 5.56 ( SD = 1.24); the mean MIS score differed significantly between the groups, t(103) = 2.10, p =.04. The diagnostic groups also differed on the MSSD of MIS scores (BPD: M = 6.11; DD: M = 4.14), t(99.68) = 2.75, p =.007, with the BPD group showing significantly greater average instability in MIS scores from moment to moment.

Table 4

Using SIDP-IV interview ratings, the relationship between MIS scores and the impulsivity criterion of BPD was determined. Most individuals in the DD group showed subthreshold impulsivity concerns ( n = 21), and only one individual met the impulsivity criterion. Therefore, we limited this analysis to the BPD patients ( n = 66). Among the BPD patients, three individuals endorsed "extreme" impulsivity (score = 3), 45 indicated above-threshold symptoms (score = 2), 15 exhibited subthreshold symptoms (score = 1), and three were rated as having no impulsivity concerns on the SIDP-IV (score = 0). Those endorsing above-threshold or extreme impulsivity (i.e., met the DSMIVTR criterion) had a significantly higher MSSD of MIS scores, t(63) = 2.05, p = .044, than individuals with subthreshold or no impulsivity concerns. Although the difference between mean MIS scores did not reach significance, t(63) = 1.68, p = .097, the expected pattern of results was observed with those scoring above threshold on the SIDP-IV impulsivity rating, exhibiting higher mean MIS scores than those below threshold.

Also shown in (top panel) are the means and standard deviations for the questionnaire measures of impulsivity. The total sample had a mean BIS-11 total score of 72.59 ( SD = 11.28), which is consistent with normative data for general psychiatric populations (see Patton et al., 1995). The BPD group had significantly higher BIS-11 total scores, t(100) = 2.62, p = .01, and motor subscale, t(100) = 3.47, p = .001, scores than the DD group. Despite also having higher scores on the attention and nonplanning subscales of the BIS-11, the BPD group scores were not significantly different than those for the DD group on these subscale scores. The average UPPS scores for the overall sample were 34.97 ( SD = 6.28) for Urgency, 24.20 ( SD = 6.09) for Lack of Premeditation, 25.06 ( SD = 5.19) for Lack of Perseverance, and 28.86 ( SD = 8.18) for Sensation Seeking. Interestingly, there were no significant differences between groups on any of the UPPS scales. Overall, the UPPS scores for the BPD group (see ) are comparable to those found by Whiteside et al. (2005).

Between- and within-individual reliability were computed for the four-item MIS scores, using Equation 2 and Equation 3 ( Nezlek & Gable, 2001; Shrout & Lane, 2012), respectively:

Results indicated that between-individual reliability was high ( 0.99) and within-individual reliability was moderate ( 0.56). This suggests that the rank ordering of individuals on MIS scores across time was very stable, whereas, as expected for a momentary experience measure, MIS scores within individuals did vary across time.

(MIS item level) and 5 (MIS full scale) show correlations between self-report questionnaires and the mean MIS score based on between-individual (averaged across study) data. The mean MIS scores correlated significantly with the BIS-11 total scores ( r = .44) and all subscales, UPPS total scores ( r = .44), UPPS Urgency ( r = .45), and UPPS Lack of Perseverance ( r = .35). The pattern of correlations obtained for the MSSD of MIS scores was very similar, and the MSSD of MIS scores was correlated with the mean MIS scores (averaged across the entire study; r = .59 and r = .72 for the DD group and BPD group, respectively). Finally, for the BPD group, correlations between both UPPS total scores and UPPS Urgency and mean MIS scores were greater than those with the MSSD of the MIS scores for the BPD group. The reverse was true for the DD group.

Discussion

The goal of the current study was to develop and evaluate a brief momentary self-report measure of impulsivity to be used in daily life investigations conducted in real-world settings. Results suggest that when many individual MIS assessments are averaged across time, the MIS begins to approximate trait impulsivity as measured by the BIS-11 and the UPPS. Additionally, the MIS can capture moment-to-moment variability in impulsivity over time.

Content Validity

MIS items appear to capture aspects of BIS-11 motor (e.g., made a "spur of the moment" decision, spent more money than meant to), nonplanning (e.g., said without thinking, spent more money than meant to), and attentional (e.g., felt impatient) impulsivity. Additionally, the MIS total score or MSSD of MIS is significantly correlated with three out of four subscales of the UPPS: Urgency, Lack of Premeditation, and Lack of Perseverance. The MIS shows the highest correlations with UPPS Urgency, which is somewhat surprising given that affect-driven impulsivity is not measured by any of the four questions in the final scale. Given the clinical nature of the current sample, it is possible that individuals in our study have negative reactions to their own impulsivity, tend to behave impulsively when experiencing negative affect, or a combination of both. Future EMA studies can administer mood items in addition to the MIS, to determine whether momentary impulsivity occurs in the context of positive or negative mood.

With regard to the UPPS, the feature of sensation seeking was not directly included in the final set of MIS items, and there were no significant relations between sensation-seeking questionnaire scores (from the UPPS) and MIS score indices (i.e., total score, MSSD, individual item score). Some of the items that were dropped due to low base rates may have been better indicators of sensation seeking (e.g., driven recklessly, feeling bored). Sensation seeking may be more challenging to assess on a momentary basis given the infrequency of its behavioral indicators (e.g., thrill-seeking behaviors). Furthermore, emerging evidence has also suggested that sensation seeking and one's ability to inhibit impulses (i.e., impulsivity, reverse scored) represent two separate constructs and may show distinct developmental pathways ( Casey, Getz, & Galvan, 2008; Harden & Tucker-Drob, 2011; Sharma et al., 2013; Steinberg et al., 2008). Specifically, sensation seeking and impulsivity appear to have different neurological underpinnings, as sensation seeking appears to be related to subcortical regions of the brain, and impulsivity is largely related to the prefrontal cortex ( Casey et al., 2008). Steinberg and colleagues (2008) found that sensation seeking peaks at age 15 and then steadily declines or remains stable, whereas impulsivity appears to peak around age 10 and then steadily declines. In addition, Harden and Tucker-Drob (2011) reported a nonsignificant relationship between change in sensation seeking and impulsivity over time, supporting the idea that these may be somewhat independent processes. Therefore, investigators interested in sensation seeking will likely need to supplement the MIS with measures specific to this construct.

Convergent Validity

Due to the lack of gold standard for assessment of momentary impulsivity, it is difficult to establish convergent validity of the MIS scores at the momentary level. The validity of the MIS scores can only be established by examining its relation with other measures in the nomological network, and construct validation is an ongoing process ( Cronbach & Meehl, 1955). Therefore, we encourage other investigators to compare the MIS with new measures of momentary impulsivity, and to examine criterion-related validity of the MIS with externalizing outcomes such as alcohol use, gambling, risky sex, and the like.

The average MIS score can be compared with existing trait measures of impulsivity, however. Positive relations between the MIS scores and trait self-report measures of impulsivity offer initial construct and convergent validity for these scale scores. Mean MIS scores were significantly correlated with all BIS-11 subscale scores and most UPPS subscale scores, the notable exception being UPPS Sensation Seeking. The MSSD of the MIS scores, which reflects moment-to-moment instability in impulsivity, was significantly associated with all BIS-11 subscales except for BIS-11 Non-Planning as well as all UPPS scores except UPPS Sensation Seeking. Concerning the former, it is possible that nonplanning is a more stable characteristic and shows less variability over time. Stanford and colleagues (2009) presented 1-month BIS-11 retest reliabilities that support this notion. Post hoc analysis comparing our baseline BIS-11 scores with the end of study scores (obtained approximately 1 month later, and used in the current analyses) suggested that Attention and Non-Planning scores were more highly correlated across time ( r = .80 and r = .77, respectively) than were Motor Impulsivity scores ( r = .67).

Although the MSSD of MIS scores captured instability of impulsivity rather than overall level, the pattern of correlational results were largely similar for mean MIS mean scores and MSSDs. This is most likely a result of the moderate to high correlation between these MIS indices, especially within the BPD group ( r = .71 in total sample; r = .59 for DD group, r = .72 for BPD group). Thus, for many applications, it may be sufficient to simply use the mean MIS score in analysis. However, there were notable differences between groups, such that the UPPS Total score and Urgency scale were more highly correlated to the mean MIS scores for the BPD group, whereas these scales were more strongly correlated with the MSSD of MIS in the DD group. Thus, total and mood-dependent impulsivity may be better assessed using both indices in clinical samples. Further research examining how mean level and MSSD of MIS scores differentially predict outcomes for various populations is needed.

Generalizability

The current results are based on a clinical sample, at least partially consisting of patients known for difficulties with impulsivity (i.e., BPD). Given that EMA studies of impulsivity often focus on proximal risk factors for impulsive behaviors, it seems appropriate to use a sample that exhibits these behaviors. However, it is possible that the resulting factor structure may not generalize to other samples. Further research is needed to examine the factor structure in other populations of interest characterized by impulsivity (e.g., antisocial personality disorder) and also nonclinical samples. For instance, it is possible that MIS scores in a nonclinical sample could show a "floor effect" such that too little endorsement of impulsivity items would result in a sample with a restricted range near the minimum possible score.

Additionally, given the nature of the diagnostic groups used in the current study and the fact that participants were recruited from clinical settings, the current sample consisted predominantly of females (89.5%). Research has demonstrated that males tend to endorse higher levels of sensation seeking (e.g., Cross, Copping, & Campbell, 2011; Cyders, 2013). This may have impacted our ability to detect sensation-seeking-related items in the current sample. With the exception of sensation seeking, however, gender differences in impulsivity are typically not found with the UPPS ( Cyders, 2013) and BIS-11 ( Patton et al., 1995), used in the current study. Future studies should examine the structural invariance of MIS scores across gender.

Finally, it should be noted that generalizability of the observed factor structure across different study durations should be examined, as it is possible that study periods much longer or shorter than the 28-day study period used in the current protocol may impact the resulting factor structure.

Limitations/Future Directions

A number of limitations of the current study should be noted. First, as a result of protocol changes, the full sample did not receive the Likert scale response format for the EMA items, limiting our sample size ( n = 105). The resulting sample size was on the lower end of acceptable ranges for between-subjects factor analysis ( Fabrigar et al., 1999). Additionally, the UPPS scale was added to the protocol after the start of data collection, and only about three fourths of the participants contributed these data ( n = 77).

EFA was conducted on a single sample with one round of data collection. As a result, the resulting four-item scale was extracted from a nine-item pool. Because neighboring items can affect responses to items, it will be important to replicate the factor structure on a separate sample with only the four items presented ( Clark & Watson, 1995; Smith, McCarthy, & Anderson, 2000). Likewise, replication of the factor structure on an independent sample is necessary, as our analysis may have reflected chance variations in the data that are specific to the sample we recruited.

Additionally, given constraints on the number of items that can be administered via an EMA protocol, the original item pool was limited. Ideally, we could have initially developed the final MIS scale using a large sample of participants for whom many repeated assessments within day, over time were available for a large number of potential items. The resulting scale could have then been applied to the samples in the current study. It is possible that alternative items not considered for inclusion in the MIS originally might perform better than the retained items. As a result of the necessary brevity, the scale does not tap into all facets of impulsivity that are assumed to underlie models of trait impulsivity (e.g., facets of UPPS). However, our results suggest that the MIS adequately assesses the general construct of impulsivity. Therefore, this scale can be used in EMA studies as a way to supplement traditional self-report measures with information regarding within-individual variability in impulsivity. However, given its length and unidimensional structure, this scale may not be ideal for differentiating between different aspects of impulsivity. Future research should examine the factor structure of impulsivity at the momentary level, as it is possible that this varies as a result of the time frame being assessed. In the current study, random assessments were completed approximately 25 hours apart. It is likely that impulsivity in this narrow time window is much different in nature than weekly, monthly, or yearly assessments, for example.

The current study relies solely on self-reported impulsivity at both trait and momentary levels. Currently, the field primarily relies on laboratory-based tasks as purported measures of state impulsivity ( Cyders & Coskunpinar, 2011; Wingrove & Bond, 1997). Laboratory-based tasks and self-report measures of impulsivity are not highly correlated, as demonstrated by a recent meta-analytic review showing an average correlation of .10 ( Cyders & Coskunpinar, 2011). Because the MIS assesses momentary impulsivity, correlations between MIS scores and laboratory-based measures thought to measure state impulsivity may be higher. It is also possible, however, that some behavioral lab tasks differ in the extent to which they capture state versus trait impulsivity.

Although the MIS, UPPS, and BIS-11 all rely on self-report, there are some important distinctions between retrospective, trait, and momentary self-report (Connor & Barrett, 2012). Specifically, a variety of memory heuristics or biases may influence the validity (or accuracy) of self-reports, especially those based on retrospection (e.g., What experiences did I have in the past?) or based on beliefs about the self (e.g., What am I typically like?). Such biases are less likely to influence momentary reports because these are typically concerning immediate or very recent mood, thoughts, and behavior. In addition, given that they characterize the immediate, experiencing self, momentary reports seem most likely to be associated with physiological and biological processes of these reported states as opposed to retrospective or trait self-reports ( Conner & Barrett, 2012). This is not to say that trait measures, for example, are not useful in some contexts (e.g., in predicting future behavior), but rather that momentary reports may hold some unique advantages in identifying physiological and biological correlates of clinically relevant experiences.

Despite the aforementioned limitations, evidence suggests that MIS scores provide meaningful information about impulsivity. Impulsivity is rarely measured using momentary, real-world methodologies. Given the increasing interest in EMA and ambulatory assessment more generally ( Trull & Ebner-Priemer, 2013), there is a need for brief, psychometrically sound measures that can be included in daily life protocols. Our results suggest that the MIS can be used for the assessment of impulsivity in daily life. We encourage other investigators to use this measure in their daily life studies in order to supplement both laboratory-based measures and traditional questionnaire measures of impulsivity. Future research using the MIS and other momentary measures of mood, experience, and behavior can fully model several psychological processes and their relations with impulsivity over time (e.g., affect and impulsivity, impulsivity and interpersonal dysfunction, etc.). Lastly, we encourage investigators using ambulatory assessment and EMA to examine the psychometrics of their momentary survey measures in order to ensure that they are measuring constructs in the real world with precision.

​

Table 5

Acknowledgments

We thank Jonathan Cook, Christine Durrett, Martha Early, Amanda Weishuhn Harris, Elizabeth Kiel Luebbe, Angela Klein, Aaron Luebbe, Jenny Rosinski, Rebecca Schwartz-Mette, Stephanie Stepp, and Erika Waller, who, in addition to co-authors Marika B. Solhan and Timothy J. Trull, administered structured interviews to all participants who were considered for inclusion in this study. Additionally, we thank Jarrod Ellingson, Marcia Kearns, Dawei Li, Andrew Littlefield, Amanda Moffitt, Yi Mou, and Jeff Rouder for their helpful feedback on drafts of this article.

Footnotes

¹ The Likert scale was adopted in an effort to reflect the dimensional nature of impulsivity features.

²For details regarding the other behaviors and constructs assessed in this study, please see Trull et al. (2008) and Jahng et al. (2011).

³ Specific information regarding the SIDP-IV impulsivity criterion was missing for one BPD individual, reducing the sample size from 67 to 66.

Contributor Information

Rachel L. Tomko, University of Missouri-Columbia and Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri.

Ryan W. Carpenter, University of Missouri-Columbia and Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri.

Whitney C. Brown, University of Missouri-Columbia and Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri.

Marika B. Solhan, University of Missouri-Columbia, Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri, and VA Boston Healthcare System, Boston, Massachusetts.

Seungmin Jahng, University of Missouri-Columbia, Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri, and Hallym University.

Phillip K. Wood, University of Missouri-Columbia and Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri.

Timothy J. Trull, University of Missouri-Columbia and Midwest Alcoholism Research Center, St. Louis, Missouri.

References

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Measuring Impulsivity in Daily Life: The Momentary Impulsivity Scale

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Impulsivity is a core feature of many psychiatric disorders. Traditionally, impulsivity has been assessed using retrospective questionnaires or laboratory tasks. Both approaches neglect intraindividual variability in impulsivity and do not capture impulsivity as it occurs in real-world settings. The goal of the current study was to provide a method for assessing impulsivity in daily life that provides both between-individual and within-individual information.

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In an experiment to test impulsive teen decision making, it was found that there are certain regions of the brain that work more when dealing with making hard choices. As one grows older, it makes sense for the brain to continue to change and adapt to its surroundings. Plasticity is the reason different parts of the brain are still developed into later adulthood. "...adolescents...showed significantly higher activity in a brain region called the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), which is involved in top-down control of behavior".

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SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA- Why do teens-especially adolescent males-commit crimes more frequently than adults? One explanation may be that as a group, teenagers react more impulsively to threatening situations than do children or adults, likely because their brains have to work harder to rein in their behavior, a research team reported here yesterday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting.

Whether it's driving too fast on a slick road or experimenting with drugs, teenagers have a reputation for courting danger that is often attributed to immaturity or poor decision-making. If immaturity or lack of judgment were the only problem, however, one would expect that children, whose brains are at an even earlier stage of development, would have an equal or greater penchant for risk-taking, says Kristina Caudle, a neuroscientist at the Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City who led the study. But younger children tend to be more cautious than teenagers, suggesting that there is something unique about adolescent brain development that lures them to danger, she says.

It's hard to generalize about teenage impulsivity, because some adolescents clearly have more self-control than many adults, says principal investigator B. J. Casey, a neuroscientist. Still, a growing body of evidence suggests that, in general, teens specifically struggle to keep their cool in social situations, she says. Because many crimes committed during adolescence involve emotionally fraught social situations, such as conflict, Caudle and colleagues decided to test whether teens perform badly on a common impulsivity task when faced with social cues of threat. They recruited 83 people, ranging in age from 6 to 29, to perform a simple "Go/No-Go" task, in which they watched a series of faces making neutral or threatening facial expressions flicker past on a computer screen. Each time the participants saw a neutral face, they were instructed to hit a button. They were also told to hold back from pressing the button when they saw a threatening face. As the participants performed the task, the researchers monitored their brain activity with functional magnetic resonance imaging.

On the whole, teenagers made about 15% more errors than adults and children when attempting to stop themselves from pressing the button when they saw the threatening facial expression, the team reports. Males performed worse than females, suggesting a sex difference that fits with the disproportionate number of crimes that male teens commit, Caudle says. Those adolescents who did manage to restrain themselves showed significantly higher activity in a brain region called the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), which is involved in top-down control of behavior. "You could think of it as the brake," Caudle says. "It's as if the teenage brain might need to work a little harder to hold that response back." This could help explain why teenage criminals are less likely to be repeat offenders, the researchers say-as their brains develop into adulthood, it gets easier for them to rein in their behavior.

"This work strongly suggests that the teenage brain is highly impulsive in the face of threat and points to unusual vmPFC activity as a possible biological underpinning," says Jon Horvitz, a neurobiologist at the City College of New York. "It is an exciting finding."

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SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA- Why do teens-especially adolescent males-commit crimes more frequently than adults? One explanation may be that as a group, teenagers react more impulsively to threatening situations than do children or adults, likely because their brains have to work harder to rein in their behavior, a research team reported here yesterday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting.

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The group of young adults that do take part in risky behaviors like drinking are more inclined to do so than someone in their 30's.  At the time, adolescents are more likely to engage in unlawful acts due to the reward center of their brain being sensitive leading to satisfy that area by partaking in risky behaviour. Adolescents are not to blame for their impulsive urges as they are a bi product of underdeveloped brains. "Increases in reward sensitivity are thought to increase trait sensation seeking,...seek out novelty and excitement…"

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In Chapter 3 of "Who's in Control", Eagleman discusses the processes or task people complete consciously and unconsciously to help his audience realize the amount of dependence one has on the brain. The memories or ideas that one develops are an effort from both the conscious and unconscious. It is clear that people do not know how their brain gets operated, so it would be wrong to make the assumption of only relying on the conscious. "...single event may be perceived ...differently by you at different stages in you life"

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Read 1,725 reviews from the world's largest community for readers. Locked in the silence and darkness of your skull, your brain fashions the rich narrative...

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In the early stages of childhood, it is hard for children to be in charge for their emotions. Constant support and coaching is needed for one to turn into a mentally stable adult. Impulsive urges are one way to classify untamed emotions that need constant coaching. "earning self-awareness and building emotional intelligence to foster responsible decision-making abilities".

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"The basic premise that children must learn about emotions is that all feelings are OK to have; however, only some reactions are OK." -Dan Siegel

Earlier today, a mom called me regarding her son's lack of impulse control. Her son, Bryan, is 6 years old and apparently punched a child on the playground. Of course, I know there's always more to the story, but clearly her son needs help learning how to slow down and make better choices even when he's angry or emotionally charged.

But before I began working with this mom, I wanted to remind her of three guiding principles regarding emotional development and impulse control, such as:

1. Brains are not fully formed till the mid-20s, and logical thinking comes online (just the beginning) around age 4 years old. What this means is your child isn't likely intentionally behaving poorly, he [or she] is simply early on in the process of training his brain to respond more constructively versus destructively when faced with challenging feelings.

2. Children who "behave badly" simply don't have the skills yet to handle the challenging emotions they're experiencing. We need to focus on skill development (not shame, blame, or guilt for whatever happened).

3. Schools that are worthy of your time and energy are teaching children how to handle their challenging emotions in the classroom (and playground). This means learning self-awareness and building emotional intelligence (social and emotional learning) to foster responsible decision-making abilities.

Most children respond without thinking, which causes problems from Bryan punching his friend to another child saying something he cannot unsay. (I always explain the idea of toothpaste when it's squeezed out-it cannot be put back in the tube. The same is true when we say something mean; we cannot unsay it. Of course, we can apologize, but that's different.) Helping a child learn how to slow down, stop, and make a better choice is sophisticated work-and nothing we need to be embarrassed about (see my book, The Emotionally Healthy Child).

In the scenario mentioned, it's a first-grade student who is just beginning his educational career and learning how to make smart choices with his big emotions. The sooner we equip this student with consistent coaching, strategies, and guidance on how his emotions work-the sooner he can begin developing self-awareness and making different choices when the inevitable feelings of frustration or anger arise.

Of course, as adults - we know, that emotional health is a lifelong endeavor and he's just beginning on the path.

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"The basic premise that children must learn about emotions is that all feelings are OK to have; however, only some reactions are OK." -Dan Siegel Earlier today, a mom called me regarding her son's lack of impulse control. Her son, Bryan, is 6 years old and apparently punched a child on the playground.

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This article discusses how it is hard to learn specific skills and master them after a specific age range. For example, adults have a harder time picking up on a language than do six year olds due to the fact that their brain looks different at fifty compared to the age of six....." Once the “critical period” — the roughly six years of life during which the brain is wired for learning language — is over, the ability to acquire a first language is lost, as your brain frees up room for the other skills"

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Op-Ed Contributor

Image

Credit Credit Jason Logan

I USED to joke that I spoke French like a 3-year-old. Until I met a French 3-year-old and couldn't hold up my end of the conversation. This was after a year of intense study, including at least two hours a day with Rosetta Stone, Fluenz and other self-instruction software, Meetup groups, an intensive weekend class and a steady diet of French movies, television and radio, followed by what I'd hoped would be the coup de grâce: two weeks of immersion at one of the top language schools in France.

"French resistance" took on an entirely new meaning as my brain repelled every strategy I employed. Yet my failure was in fact quite unremarkable. Advertising claims notwithstanding, few adults who tackle a foreign language achieve anything resembling proficiency. In the end, though, it turns out that spending a year not learning French may have been the best thing I could've done for my 57-year-old brain.

In the last few years, unable to hold a list of just four grocery items in my head, I'd begun to fret a bit over my literal state of mind. So to reassure myself that nothing was amiss, just before tackling French I took a cognitive assessment called CNS Vital Signs, recommended by a psychologist friend. The results were anything but reassuring: I scored below average for my age group in nearly all of the categories, notably landing in the bottom 10th percentile on the composite memory test and in the lowest 5 percent on the visual memory test.

This, obviously, did not bode well for my nascent language project, but I forged ahead. To be sure, learning a foreign language is a daunting task for any adult. How can something that a toddler accomplishes before learning to tie his shoes be so difficult for grown-ups?

Psycholinguists are divided on the answer, but they agree on several points. For starters, a 2-year-old's brain has a substantial neurological advantage, with 50 percent more synapses - the connections between neurons - than an adult brain, way more than it needs. This excess, which is an insurance policy against early trauma, is also crucial to childhood language acquisition, as is the plasticity, or adaptability, of the young brain.

Once the "critical period" - the roughly six years of life during which the brain is wired for learning language - is over, the ability to acquire a first language is lost, as your brain frees up room for the other skills you'll need as you mature, such as the ability to kill a wild boar, or learn math, or operate your iPad.

Another advantage a toddler holds is his very lack of experience. After speaking our native language for decades, we adults can't help but hear the second language through the filter of the first. And this filter doesn't take decades to develop. Researchers have found that newborn Japanese babies can distinguish between the English "L" and "R" sounds, but if not exposed to Western languages, they begin to lose that ability - not by the age of 6 or even 3 - but by eight months.

Adult language learners are, to borrow a phrase used by some psycholinguists, too smart for our own good. We process too much data at once, try to get everything right from the get-go and are self-conscious about our efforts. But toddlers instinctively grasp what's important and are quite content to say, "Tommy hitted me," as long as Tommy gets what's coming to him.

All this means that we adults have to work our brains hard to learn a second language. But that may be all the more reason to try, for my failed French quest yielded an unexpected benefit. After a year of struggling with the language, I retook the cognitive assessment, and the results shocked me. My scores had skyrocketed, placing me above average in seven of 10 categories, and average in the other three. My verbal memory score leapt from the bottom half to the 88th - the 88th! - percentile and my visual memory test shot from the bottom 5th percentile to the 50th. Studying a language had been like drinking from a mental fountain of youth.

What might explain such an improvement?

Last year researchers at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Northwestern University in Illinois hypothesized that language study should prove beneficial for older adults, noting that the cognitive tasks involved - including working memory, inductive reasoning, sound discrimination and task switching - map closely to the areas of the brain that are most associated with declines due to aging. In other words, the things that make second-language acquisition so maddening for grown-ups are the very things that may make the effort so beneficial.

The quest for a mental fountain of youth, pursued by baby boomers who fear that their bodies will outlive their brains, and who have deeper pockets than Juan Ponce de León, has created a billion-dollar industry. There is some evidence that brain exercise programs like Lumosity and Nintendo's Brain Age can be beneficial, but if my admittedly unscientific experience is any indication, you might be better off studying a language instead. Not only is that a far more useful and enjoyable activity than an abstract brain game, but as a reward for your efforts, you can treat yourself to a trip abroad. Which is why I plan to spend the next year not learning Italian. Ciao!

William Alexander is the author of the forthcoming book "Flirting With French: How a Language Charmed Me, Seduced Me, and Nearly Broke My Heart."

A version of this article appears in print on , Section A, Page 23 of the New York edition with the headline: The Benefits of Failing at French. Order Reprints | Today's Paper | Subscribe

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Opinion | The Benefits of Failing at French

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Op-Ed Contributor I USED to joke that I spoke French like a 3-year-old. Until I met a French 3-year-old and couldn't hold up my end of the conversation.