Assessment of Impulsivity in Preschoolers: Cross-Measure Convergences, Longitudinal Stability, and Relevance to Social Competence

Abstract

Multiple measures of impulsivity were assessed in a normative sample of 79 preschoolers–including tests of cognitive impulsivity, motor inhibition, and delay of gratification, as welt as teacher ratings. Factor analyses revealed a high degree of independence among measures, which mainly clustered according to shared method variance. Different measures showed highly variable patterns of long-term stability. Behavioral ratings of poor self-control with peers and teachers and impulsive performance on a delay-of-gratification test were concurrently and longitudinally related to indices of impaired social competence, particularly peer rejection and deviant social problem solving. Other measures of impulsivity showed negligible correlations with social competence variables. These data suggest that there may be several different subtypes of impulsivity in early childhood, with different implications for social development.