Behavior regulation and mood predict social functioning among healthy young adults

Abstract

Impulsive behavior is thought to lead to both positive and negative psychosocial outcomes. However, little is known about the potential consequences of subclinical expressions of behavior dysregulation on everyday functioning. To examine this relationship, global social functioning was measured in 89 healthy, young adults who also completed the Degraded Stimulus Continuous Performance Test, Color–Word Interference Test, Barratt Impulsiveness Scale, 11th Edition, and Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning–Adult. Better self-reported executive functioning and mood were significant independent predictors of higher social functioning, even in a sample of healthy adults. The results of this study may serve as a foundation for comparison with clinical populations who demonstrate greater behavior dysregulation and mood instability.

Keywords:

• Impulsivity
• Executive functioning
• Mood
• Healthy adults
• Social functioning

Acknowledgments

This study was partially supported by the University Research Council student fellowship from the University of Cincinnati and the Seeman Frakes research award from the Department of Psychology at the University of Cincinnati. We would like to thank Steven Howe Ph.D. for his contributions to the statistical analyses and Brian Bell and Claudia Ninneman for their assistance with data entry.

Notes

¹Our original hypothesis called for a direct comparison of self-report and performance-based measures as predictors, and so we did run the model with all of these variables included, to verify that our decision to exclude the performance-based measures based on the bivariate correlations was sound. The results of that analysis were the same as those presented below for the self-report measures alone.