The Effect of Introversion and Extroversion and Level of Vigilance on Alcohol Consumption

Kerry O’Mahoney

Personality type:

Introverts: described as people who are generally quiet, reserved and thoughtful. They are thought to have relatively higher levels of brain arousal, which causes them to shy away from over stimulating social environments.

Extroverts: described as people who are generally sociable, active and outgoing.

Coping Style:

Vigilant coping style: are more likely to exaggerate threatening information in situations of high anxiety and stress and are more likely to seek medical attention. They are also highly disposed to preparation and preventative control and show a need for as much information as possible before beginning a task.

Avoidant Coping Style: prefer not to be aware of negative information and therefore distract themselves from all negative situations. This behavior is associated with some negative characteristics such as procrastination, problems with time management, task aversiveness, thrill seeking, and intolerance to arousal.

Article #1:

Research found that avoidance coping predicted an increase in alcohol consumption. Substance abuse can be viewed as an avoidant coping mechanism utilized when adaptive coping alternatives are not available. (Litman, Eiser, Rawson, and Oppenheim 1979)

Article #2:

Increased Alcohol consumption is positively correlated with sociability and extroversion

(Cook, 1998)

My Study: Do Extroverts with avoidant coping behavior consume alcohol in a larger quantity and with more frequency?

IV: Level of vigilance( avoidant or vigilant)

IV: Personality Type (Introvert or extrovert)

DV: Quantity and frequency of consumption

2x2 interaction

Procedure: Fill out three questionnaires

1. Ways of coping checklist

2. Eysenck personality inventory

3. The Q-F-V

Predictions:

1. An interaction between personality type and coping behavior (avoidant or vigilant)

2. A Main effect of coping behavior on alcohol consumption Main It does look like two main effects w/o interaction.

Hypothesis:

Extroverted avoidant subjects will consume the most alcohol of the four groups. Extroverted Vigilant subjects will consume less that Extroverted Avoidant but more than introverted subjects. Introverted avoidant subjects will consume more than introverted vigilant subjects, who will consume the least of the four groups.

	Introversion	Extroversion
Avoidant	40	100
Vigilant	20	70