Objective Impulsive personality traits have been robustly associated with alcohol and drug misuse, but have received little attention in the context of food addiction. The goal of the current study was to examine the interrelationships between impulsive personality traits, food addiction, and Body Mass Index (BMI), including indirect pathways of influence. Method Participants (N = 233) completed the Yale Food Addiction Scale (YFAS) to assess patterns of addictive consumption of food, the UPPS-P Impulsivity Scale to assess impulsive personality traits, and provided weight and height to generate BMI. Results Significant positive associations were found between facets of impulsivity, food addiction symptoms, and BMI. Impulsivity was found to be indirectly associated with BMI by way of associations with addictive consumption of food. In particular, an inclination toward behaving irrationally while experiencing negative mood states (Negative Urgency) and low levels of task persistence (lack of Perseverance) were significantly associated with food addiction directly and that relationship was responsible for their relationship to BMI. Conclusions Dispositional impulsivity, routinely associated with high-risk behaviors including addictive consumption of alcohol and drugs, may be an important risk factor when considering tendency to engage in addictive consumption of food. Monitoring food addiction symptoms early may help reduce the likelihood that compulsive food consumption patterns result in weight gain and obesity. Methodological considerations are discussed.

Rationale Impulsivity and mindfulness both emphasize orientation to the present, and both have been linked to alcohol misuse, but the relationship between the two is not clearly understood. Objectives To examine the relationships between elements of impulsivity and mindfulness, and to examine both variables in relation to alcohol misuse. Method Young adults (N = 116) were assessed for alcohol use, mindfulness, and impulsivity using psychometrically validated measures. Results Numerous significant associations were present among the facets of impulsivity and mindfulness. The variable most substantially associated with alcohol misuse was Negative Urgency (NU; i.e., proneness to act out under conditions of negative affect). After controlling for other variables, Negative Urgency (NU), Positive Urgency (PU), and delay discounting (DD) were significantly related to alcohol consumption. When examining drinking related consequences, only Lack of Premeditation (LoP) and Negative Urgency (NU) were significant associated. Conclusions There was considerable overlap between some elements of impulsivity and mindfulness while the overlap was negligible for other facets. The associations between mindfulness and alcohol misuse were entirely a function of impulsivity. In particular, acting on impulses while experiencing negative affect was significantly associated with level of alcohol consumption and level of alcohol-related risk. Steep discounting of future rewards was associated with alcohol consumption while poor premeditation was associated with adverse drinking consequences. These findings illustrate the importance of jointly studying impulsivity when examining purported effects of mindfulness traits.

These findings further support a behavioral economic approach to craving and a multidimensional conception of acute motivation for addictive drugs. Methodological considerations, including potential order effects, and the need for further refinement of these findings are discussed.

Aims Novel methods in behavioral economics permit the systematic assessment of the relationship between cigarette consumption and price. Toward informing tax policy, the goals of this study were to conduct a high-resolution analysis of cigarette demand in a large sample of adult smokers and to use the data to estimate the effects of tax increases in ten U.S. States. Design In-person descriptive survey assessment. Setting Academic departments at three universities. Participants Adult daily smokers (i.e., 5+ cigarettes/day; 18+ years old; ≥8th grade education); N = 1056. Measurements Estimated cigarette demand, demographics, expired carbon monoxide. Findings The cigarette demand curve exhibited highly variable levels of price sensitivity, especially in the form of ‘left-digit effects’ (i.e., very high price sensitivity as pack prices transitioned from one whole number to the next; e.g., $5.80-$6/pack). A $1 tax increase in the ten states was projected to reduce the economic burden of smoking by an average of $531M (range: $93.6M-$976.5M) and increase gross tax revenue by an average of 162% (range: 114%- 247%). Conclusions Tobacco price sensitivity is nonlinear across the demand curve and in particular for pack-level left-digit price transitions. Tax increases in U.S. states with similar price and tax rates to the sample are projected to result in substantial decreases in smoking-related costs and substantial increases in tax revenues.

and at the level of the individual smoker, behavioral economic studies have similarly revealed that the costs of cigarettes substantially affect consumption (e.g., Johnson & Bickel, 2006).Within behavioral economics, individual demand curve analysis is one methodology to quantify the relative value of commodities, including cigarettes. This refers to examining the relationship between a person's consumption of a commodity and its cost. As prices increase, demand typically decreases at a relatively low rate initially but then becomes more precipitous at higher prices, finally terminating altogether. Importantly, several indices of motivation can be generated from demand curves (Hursh & Silberberg, 2008;Murphy & MacKillop, 2006). For example, the start and the finish of the demand curve are referred to as intensity and breakpoint. Intensity is defined as consumption at zero or minimal cost, whereas breakpoint is defined as the first price that fully suppresses consumption to zero. In addition, a demand curve can be used to generate a measure of expenditure, termed O max (i.e., maximum expenditure across prices), and a measure of overall price sensitivity, termed elasticity (i.e., the proportional slope of the demand curve or, more simply, how responsive the individual is to increases in price). Together, these indices provide a multidimensional assessment of an individual's relative value of cigarettes.A recent approach for conducting demand curve analysis is the use of a cigarette purchase task (CPT), which assesses individuals' estimated consumption of cigarettes at varying levels of price. This typically starts at zero or very low prices and escalates to very high prices. A CPT permits relatively rapid detailed assessment of consumption for a wide array of prices and facilitates examining individual variation in cigarette demand as a potentially relevant determinant of smoking and nicotine dependence. The benefits of this approach are its time-and cost-efficiency and capacity for highly detailed data collection. In contrast, in vivo laboratory assessments of demand can be limited by participant and experimenter burden, small sample size requirements, limited price options, and potential ethical issues in clinical populations (Jacobs & Bickel, 1999;MacKillop et al., 2008).Although only a small number of studies using self-report purchase tasks have been published, the data so far are promising. AbstractIntroduction: Cigarette purchase tasks (CPTs) are relatively new behavioral economic assessments that efficiently quantify motivation for tobacco by assessing how much an individual values cigarettes. This is achieved by assessing estimated cigarette consumption at escalating levels of price per cigarette and generating several measures of motivation from the resulting demand curve. The temporal stability of the indices generated from a CPT has not been examined to date and was the focus of the current study.Methods: Participants were 11 moderately heavy smokers from the community who completed CPTs and other meas...