Examining impulsivity and risky decision making among school youth in balloon analogue risk task

Ying Gong; Jin Yan; Yunlong Deng; Cuiyu Bao; Qifeng Yi; Jia Liu; Zhihao Zhang

doi:10.21037/tp-21-594

Examining impulsivity and risky decision making among school youth in balloon analogue risk task

Transl Pediatr. 2022 Jan;11(1):127-137. doi: 10.21037/tp-21-594.

Authors

Ying Gong¹, Jin Yan¹, Yunlong Deng², Cuiyu Bao³, Qifeng Yi¹, Jia Liu¹, Zhihao Zhang⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Nursing, the Third Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China.
² Department of Clinical Psychology, the Third Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China.
³ Office of Academic Affairs, Hubei University of Science and Technology, Xianning, China.
⁴ Xiangya School of Nursing, Central South University, Changsha, China.

Abstract

Background: Impulsivity trait as a risk factor which typically displayed in risk decision among school youth. This study aims to examine behavioral and cognitive problems of risky decision among Chinese young people aged 15-25 years. The balloon analogue risk task (BART) and event-related potential (ERP) were combine used to explore the neural mechanism of risky decision process whether infected by impulsivity trait.

Methods: A total of 31 subjects were included, including 16 experimental subjects with risk behavior (RS), and 15 health control subjects with non-risk behavior (HC). BART were used to measure risk-taking propensity and ERP were to record in real time. RS vs. HC were compared to explain the relationship between impulsivity and risky decision.

Results: Behavioral data in BART task shown that the RS subjects tended to make risky decisions. ERP results illustrate that P300 in RS subjects is more significant positive-going than HC that means dysfunction of cognitive control, and FRN in RS subjects is more negative-going than HC in negative feedback condition, which means individual with high impulsive would be more sensitive to unexpected outcome.

Conclusions: Impulsiveness is a risk factor for school adolescent, because RS subjects performed more risky decision than control group, the evidence indicate that individual with high impulsiveness would lead to be less sensitive to harmful consequences and more inclination to immediate rewards. Therefore, the inclination of risk taking can be powerfully informed by different levels of impulsiveness.

Keywords: P300; Risky decision; event-related potential; feedback-related negativity (FRN); impulsivity.