Reflection-impulsivity, personality and performance: a psychometric and validity study of the Matching Familiar Figures Test in detoxified alcoholics

Impulsiveness is frequently discussed in the context of alcoholism and self -rating questionnaires are widely used to measure it. While probes of behav ior are utilized very rarely in alcoholics they may be especially suitable for measuring impulsivity within a clinical context. In this study we used the Matching Familiar Figures Test (MFFT), a behavioral test to investigate the reflection-impulsivity dimension. Examined were 161 detoxified patient s who were suffering from alcohol dependence but who other-wise had no othe r comorbid psychiatric disorders. The patients were assigned numerous perfo rmance tests and personality questionnaires to investigate the relationship between the reflection-impulsivity-classification in the MFFT, clinical da ta as related to alcoholism, and self-rated personality and performance mea sures. We found no evidence for a relationship between clinical data as rel ated to alcoholism and reflection-impulsivity. MFFT-reflective alcoholics w ere more intelligent, their concentration ability was higher, and they reac ted faster in reaction time tasks than MFFT-impulsives. These results suppo rt authors who consider the MFFT to be primarily an ability test. However, the traditional classification depends more strongly on individual variabil ity in performance than the item-based classification proposed here. The mo st interesting personality difference between MFFT-reflectives and MFFT-imp ulsives was the difference in Novelty Seeking (NS). NS scores were signific antly higher among MFFT-impulsives compared to MFFT-reflectives. Additional ly, a logistic regression analysis identified the NS-subscore "Impulsivenes s vs. Reflection" as a significant predictor of the MFFT-classification. Th ese results confirm the hypothesis that the MFFT is useful as an objective behavioral measurement tool for a certain cognitive aspect of impulsivity ( quick, intuitive decision vs. carefully considered decision). However, our analysis also affirms that this aspect of impulsivity is closely linked to intelligence. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.