Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, 1355 Oxford Street, Halifax, NS B3H 4R2, Canada.
Department of Psychology, St. Francis Xavier University, 2323 Notre Dame Avenue, Antigonish, NS B3G 2W5, Canada.
Addict Behav. 2018 Dec;87:122-130. doi: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2018.07.001. Epub 2018 Jul 4.
Emerging adults (18-25 year olds) endorse the highest rates of prescription drug misuse. Attending college or university may confer additional risk. Previous research suggests that personality is an important predictor of many addictive behaviours. Four traits have been consistently implicated: anxiety sensitivity, hopelessness, sensation seeking, and impulsivity. Published studies on personality as a predictor of prescription drug abuse are limited, however, by a primary focus on overall prescription drug use, inconsistent operationalisation of misuse, and failure to control for alcohol use. Sample sizes have been small and non-specific. We sought to better understand how personality predicted the overall use, the medically-sanctioned use, and the misuse of prescription sedatives/tranquilizers, opioids, and stimulants. A large (N = 1755) sample of first year Canadian undergraduate students (mean age = 18.6 years; 68.9% female) was used. We predicted that: anxiety sensitivity would be related to sedatives/tranquilizers, hopelessness to opioids, sensation seeking to stimulants, and impulsivity to all three. Save for the impulsivity to opioid use path, predictions were fully supported in our "any use" model. For medically-sanctioned use: anxiety sensitivity predicted sedative/tranquilizers, hopelessness predicted opioids, and impulsivity predicted stimulants. For misuse: anxiety sensitivity (marginally) predicted sedatives/tranquilizers, sensation seeking predicted stimulants, and impulsivity predicted all three. Our models support using personality-matched interventions. Specifically, results suggest targeting anxiety sensitivity for sedative/tranquilizer misuse, sensation seeking for stimulant misuse, and impulsivity for unconstrained prescription drug misuse. Interventions with early coping skills that pertain to all four traits might be useful for preventing prescription drug uptake and later misuse.
新兴成年人（18-25 岁）的处方药滥用率最高。上大学或学院可能会增加额外的风险。之前的研究表明，个性是许多成瘾行为的重要预测因素。有四个特质一直被牵涉其中：焦虑敏感、绝望、寻求刺激和冲动。然而，关于个性作为处方药滥用预测因素的已发表研究受到限制，主要是因为它们主要关注整体处方药使用、误用的不一致操作化以及未能控制酒精使用。样本量很小，且不具有特异性。我们试图更好地理解个性如何预测处方药镇静剂/安定、阿片类药物和兴奋剂的总体使用、医学上认可的使用和滥用。我们使用了一个大型（N=1755）的加拿大一年级本科学生样本（平均年龄 18.6 岁；68.9%为女性）。我们预测：焦虑敏感与镇静剂/安定有关，绝望与阿片类药物有关，寻求刺激与兴奋剂有关，冲动与所有三种药物有关。除了冲动与阿片类药物使用路径的预测外，在我们的“任何使用”模型中，所有预测都得到了充分支持。对于医学上认可的使用：焦虑敏感预测镇静剂/安定，绝望预测阿片类药物，冲动预测兴奋剂。对于滥用：焦虑敏感（边缘）预测镇静剂/安定，寻求刺激预测兴奋剂，冲动预测所有三种药物。我们的模型支持使用个性匹配的干预措施。具体而言，结果表明针对镇静剂/安定剂的误用靶向焦虑敏感，针对兴奋剂的误用靶向寻求刺激，以及针对不受约束的处方药滥用靶向冲动。针对所有四个特质的早期应对技能干预可能对预防处方药使用和以后的滥用有用。
