Keep calm and carry on: Maintaining self-control when intoxicated, upset, or depleted

ABSTRACT

This study tested within-person associations between intoxication, negative affect, and self-control demands and two forms of self-control failure, interpersonal conflict, and neglecting responsibilities. Effortful control was hypothesised to act as a buffer, reducing individual susceptibility to these within-person effects. In contrast, reactivity was hypothesised to potentiate the within-person associations. 274 young adults aged 18–27 (56% women, 93% white) completed experience sampling assessments for up to 49 days over the course of 1.3 years. Results indicated independent within-person effects of intoxication, negative affect, and self-control demands on the outcomes. Hypothesised moderating effects of reactivity were not supported. Effortful control did not moderate the effects of self-control demands as expected. However, effortful control exhibited a protective effect when individuals were intoxicated or upset to reduce the likelihood of maladaptive behavioural outcomes.

KEYWORDS:

• Self-control
• aggression
• ecological momentary assessment
• interpersonal conflict
• self-regulation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Noah N. Emery http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4891-2303

Additional information

Funding

The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: preparation of this manuscript was supported by grant R01AA017433 (J. S. S.), R01AA020519 (J.S.S.) from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism and grant R01 DA021856 (T. A. W.) from the National Institute on Drug Abuse and grant P30 CA071789 (T. A. W.) from the National Cancer Institute.