Risky Business: Behavioral Profiles of Sexually-Impulsive Adults in the United States

The goal of the present study is to clarify the heterogeneity of risky behaviors (such as substance use, gambling, and crime) and psychiatric disorders among a large sample of 5304 nationally representative adults who acknowledge engaging in sexually-impulsive behaviors. Participants were selected from more than 43,000 respondents of the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). Latent class analysis was used to identify subgroups of sexually-impulsive individuals and then multinomial regression was used to identify the relative risk for comorbidity with related impulsive behaviors or psychiatric disorders. Results showed that a four class solution provided the best fit and revealed higher odds of experiencing specific comorbid risky behaviors or psychiatric disorders based on class membership. Results challenge the widely held notion that self-regulatory behaviors are impacted globally, and instead suggest that certain self-regulatory behaviors are more likely to be impacted when other underlying conditions are present in sexually-impulsive individuals. Implications of this heterogeneity and recommendations for health care providers are discussed.