title: Nellie Melba

text: The young singer's talent was so evident that, after less than a year with Marchesi, the impresario Maurice Strakosch gave her a ten-year contract at 1000 francs annually. After she had signed, she received a far better offer of 3000 francs per month from the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, but Strakosch would not release her and obtained an injunction preventing her from accepting it. She was in despair when the matter was resolved by Strakosch's sudden death. She made her operatic debut four days later as Gilda in "Rigoletto" at La Monnaie on 12 October 1887. The critic Herman Klein described her Gilda as "an instant triumph of the most emphatic kind ... followed ... a few nights later with an equal success as Violetta in "La traviata"." It was at this time, on Marchesi's advice, that she adopted the stage name of "Melba", a contraction of the name of her home city.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba made her Covent Garden début in May 1888, in the title role in "Lucia di Lammermoor". She received a friendly but not excited reception. "The Musical Times" wrote, "Madame Melba is a fluent vocalist, and a quite respectable representative of light soprano parts; but she lacks the personal charm necessary to a great figure on the lyric stage." She was offended when Augustus Harris, then in charge at Covent Garden, offered her only the small role of the page Oscar in "Un ballo in maschera" for the next season. She left England vowing never to return. The following year, she performed at the Opéra in Paris, in the role of Ophélie in "Hamlet"; "The Times" described this as "a brilliant success", and said, "Madame Melba has a voice of great flexibility ... her acting is expressive and striking."


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba had a strong supporter in London, Lady de Grey, whose views carried weight at Covent Garden. Melba was persuaded to return, and Harris cast her in "Roméo et Juliette" (June 1889) co-starring with Jean de Reszke. She later recalled, "I date my success in London quite distinctly from the great night of 15 June 1889." After this, she returned to Paris as Ophélie, Lucia in "Lucia di Lammermoor", Gilda in "Rigoletto", Marguerite in "Faust", and Juliette. In French operas her pronunciation was poor, but the composer Delibes said that he did not care whether she sang in French, Italian, German, English or Chinese, as long as she sang.


title: Nellie Melba

text: In the early 1890s, Melba embarked on an affair with Prince Philippe, Duke of Orléans. They were seen frequently together in London, which excited some gossip, but far more suspicion arose when Melba travelled across Europe to St Petersburg to sing for Tsar Nicholas II: the Duke followed closely behind her, and they were spotted together in Paris, Brussels, Vienna and St Petersburg. Armstrong filed divorce proceedings on the grounds of Melba's adultery, naming the Duke as co-respondent; he was eventually persuaded to drop the case, but the Duke decided that a two-year African safari (without Melba) would be appropriate. He and Melba did not resume their relationship. In the first years of the decade, Melba appeared in the leading European opera houses, including Milan, Berlin and Vienna.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba sang the role of Nedda in "Pagliacci" at Covent Garden in 1893, soon after its Italian premiere. The composer was present, and said that the role had never been so well played before. In December of that year, Melba sang at the Metropolitan Opera in New York for the first time. As at her Covent Garden debut, she appeared as Lucia di Lammermoor, and as at Covent Garden, it was less than a triumph. "The New York Times" praised her performance – "one of the loveliest voices that ever issued from a human throat ... simply delicious in its fullness, richness and purity" – but the work was out of fashion, and the performances were poorly attended. Her performance in "Roméo et Juliette", later in the season, was a triumph and established her as the leading prima donna of the time in succession to Adelina Patti. She had at first been nonplussed by the impenetrable snobbery at the Metropolitan; the author Peter Conrad has written, "In London she hobnobbed with royalty; in New York she was a singing menial." Assured of critical success, she set herself to achieve social recognition, and succeeded.


title: Nellie Melba

text: From the 1890s, Melba played a wide range of parts at Covent Garden, mostly in the lyric soprano repertoire, but with some heavier roles also. She sang the title roles in Herman Bemberg's "Elaine" and Arthur Goring Thomas's "Esmeralda". Her Italian parts included Gilda in "Rigoletto", the title role in "Aida", Desdemona in "Otello", Luisa in Mascagni's "I Rantzau", Nedda in "Pagliacci", Rosina in "The Barber of Seville", Violetta in "La traviata", and Mimì in "La bohème". In the French repertoire, she sang Juliette in "Roméo et Juliette", Marguerite in "Faust", Marguerite de Valois in "Les Huguenots", the title role in Saint-Saëns's "Hélène", which was written for her, and Micaëla in "Carmen".


title: Nellie Melba

text: Some writers expressed surprise at Melba's playing the last of these roles, since it was merely a supporting part in the opera. She played it on many occasions, saying in her memoirs, "Why on earth a prima donna should not sing secondary "rôles" I could not see then and am no nearer seeing to-day. I hate the artistic snobbery of it." She sang the role opposite the Carmens of Emma Calvé, Zélie de Lussan and Maria Gay. Marguerite de Valois, too, is not the leading female role in "Les Huguenots", but Melba was willing to undertake it as "seconda donna" to Emma Albani. She was generous in support of singers who did not rival her in her favoured roles, but was, as her biographer J. B. Steane put it, "pathologically critical" of other lyric sopranos.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba was not known as a Wagner singer, although she occasionally sang Elsa in "Lohengrin" and Elisabeth in "Tannhäuser". She received a certain amount of praise in these roles, although Klein found her unsuited to them, and Bernard Shaw thought she sang with great skill but played artificially and without sensibility. In 1896 at the Metropolitan, she attempted the role of Brünnhilde in "Siegfried", in which she was not a success. Her most frequent role in that house was Marguerite in Gounod's "Faust", which she had studied under the supervision of the composer. She never essayed any of Mozart's operas, for which some thought her voice ideally suited. Her repertoire across her entire career amounted to no more than 25 roles, of which, "The Times" obituarist wrote, "only some 10 parts are those which will be remembered as her own."


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's marriage to Armstrong was finally terminated when, having emigrated to the United States with their son, he divorced her in Texas in 1900.


title: Nellie Melba

text: By now established as a leading star in Britain and America, Melba made her first return visit to Australia in 1902–03 for a concert tour, also touring in New Zealand. The profits were unprecedented; she returned for four more tours during her career. In Britain, Melba campaigned on behalf of Puccini's "La bohème". She had first sung the part of Mimì in 1899, having studied it with the composer. She argued strongly for further productions of the work in the face of the distaste expressed by the Covent Garden management at this "new and plebeian opera". She was vindicated by the public enthusiasm for the piece, which was bolstered in 1902 when Enrico Caruso joined her in the first of many Covent Garden performances together. She sang Mimì for Oscar Hammerstein I at his opera house in New York, in 1907, giving the enterprise a needed boost. After her initial successes in Brussels and Paris in the 1880s, Melba sang infrequently on the European continent; only the English-speaking countries welcomed her wholeheartedly.


title: Nellie Melba

text: She performed 26 times at the Royal Albert Hall in London between 1898 and 1926. Although she called Covent Garden "my artistic home", her appearances there became less frequent in the 20th century. One reason for this was that she did not get on well with Sir Thomas Beecham, who was in control of the opera house for much of the period from 1910 until her retirement. She said, "I dislike Beecham and his methods", and he thought that while she had "nearly all the attributes inseparable from great artistry ... she was wanting in a genuine spiritual refinement." Another factor in her reduced appearances at Covent Garden was the appearance on the scene of Luisa Tetrazzini, a soprano ten years her junior, who became a great success in London and later in New York in roles previously associated with Melba. A third reason was her decision to spend more time in Australia. In 1909 she undertook what she called a "sentimental tour" of Australia, covering 10,000 miles (16,000 km) and including many remote towns. In 1911 in partnership with the J. C. Williamson company, she appeared in an operatic season. Her attitude to her tour concerts and the audiences attending was summed up in the advice that Clara Butt said Melba gave her apropos of a planned Australian tour: "Sing 'em muck; it's all they can understand." To another colleague and compatriot, Peter Dawson, she described his home city of Adelaide as "that city of the three P's – Parsons, Pubs and Prostitutes."


title: Nellie Melba

text: In 1909, Melba bought property at Coldstream, a small town near Melbourne, and in 1912 she had a home built there (extending an existing cottage) that she named Coombe Cottage after a house she had rented near London. She also set up a music school in Richmond, which she later merged into the Melbourne Conservatorium. She was in Australia when the First World War broke out, and she threw herself into fund-raising for war charities, raising £100,000. In recognition of this, she was created a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in March 1918, "for services in organising patriotic work".


title: Nellie Melba

text: After the war, Melba made a triumphant return to the Royal Opera House, in a performance of "La bohème" conducted by Beecham, which re-opened the house after four years of closure. "The Times" wrote, "Probably no season at Covent Garden has ever started with quite the thrill of enthusiasm which passed through the house." In her many concerts, however, her repertoire was regarded as trite and predictable. After one of them "The Musical Times" wrote:


title: Nellie Melba

text: In 1922, Melba returned to Australia, where she sang at the immensely successful "Concerts for the People" in Melbourne and Sydney, with low ticket prices, attracting 70,000 people. In 1924 for another Williamson opera season, she caused resentment among local singers by importing an entire chorus from Naples. In 1926 she made her farewell appearance at Covent Garden, singing in scenes from "Roméo et Juliette", "Otello", and "La bohème". She is well remembered in Australia for her seemingly endless series of "farewell" appearances, including stage performances in the mid-1920s and concerts in Sydney on 7 August 1928, Melbourne on 27 September 1928 and Geelong in November 1928. From this, she is remembered in the vernacular Australian expression "more farewells than Dame Nellie Melba".


title: Nellie Melba

text: In 1929 she returned for the last time to Europe and then visited Egypt, where she contracted a fever that she never entirely shook off. Her last performance was in London at a charity concert on 10 June 1930. She returned to Australia but died in St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, in 1931, aged 69, of septicaemia which had developed after facial surgery in Europe some time before. She was given an elaborate funeral from Scots' Church, Melbourne, which her father had built and where as a teenager she had sung in the choir. The funeral motorcade was over a kilometre long, and her death made front-page headlines in Australia, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Europe. Billboards in many countries said simply "Melba is dead". Part of the event was filmed for posterity. Melba was buried in the cemetery at Lilydale, near Coldstream. Her headstone, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, bears the farewell words of Mimì in "La bohème": "" (Farewell, without bitterness).


title: Nellie Melba

text: Despite the antipathy Melba inspired in some of her peers, she helped the careers of younger singers. She taught for many years at the Conservatorium in Melbourne and looked for a "new Melba". She published a book about her methods, which were based on those of Marchesi. The book opens:


title: Nellie Melba

text: Others also benefited from Melba's praise and interest. She passed her own cadenzas on to a young Gertrude Johnson, a valuable professional asset. In 1924, Melba brought the new star Toti Dal Monte, fresh from triumphs in Milan and Paris but still unheard in England or the United States, to Australia as a principal of the Melba-Williamson Grand Opera Company. After sharing the Covent Garden stage in a 1923 night of operatic extracts with another Australian soprano, Florence Austral (who, as a dramatic soprano, posed no threat to Melba, a lyric soprano), Melba was effusive with her praise, describing the younger woman as "one of the wonder-voices of the world". She similarly described the American contralto Louise Homer as possessing "the world's most beautiful voice". She gave financial assistance to the Australian painter Hugh Ramsay, living in poverty in Paris and also helped him to forge connections in the artistic world. The Australian baritone John Brownlee and tenor Browning Mummery were both protégés: both sang with her in her 1926 Covent Garden farewell (recorded by HMV), and Brownlee sang with her on two of her last commercial recordings later that year (a session arranged by her in part to promote Brownlee).


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's first recordings were made around 1895, recorded on cylinders at the Bettini Phonograph Lab in New York. A reporter from Phonoscope magazine was impressed: "The next cylinder was labelled 'Melba' and was truly wonderful, the phonograph reproducing her wonderful voice in a marvellous manner, especially the high notes which soared away above the staff and were rich and clear." Melba was less impressed: "'Never again,' I said to myself as I listened to the scratching, screeching result. 'Don't tell me I sing like that, or I shall go away and live on a desert island.'" The recordings never reached the general public – destroyed on Melba's orders, it is suspected – and Melba would not venture into a recording studio for another eight years. Melba can be heard singing on several Mapleson Cylinders, early attempts at live recording, made by the Metropolitan Opera House librarian Lionel Mapleson in the auditorium there during performances. These cylinders are often poor in quality, but they preserve something of the quality of the young Melba's voice and performance that is sometimes lacking from her commercial recordings.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba made numerous gramophone (phonograph) records of her voice in England and America between 1904 (when she was in her 40s) and 1926 for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company and the Victor Talking Machine Company. Most of these recordings, consisting of operatic arias, duets and ensemble pieces and songs, have been re-released on CD. The poor audio fidelity of the Melba recordings reflects the limitations of the early days of commercial sound recording. Melba's acoustical recordings (especially those made after her initial 1904 session) fail to capture vital overtones to the voice, leaving it without the body and warmth it possessed – albeit to a limited degree – in life. Despite this, they still reveal Melba to have had an almost seamlessly pure lyric soprano voice with effortless coloratura, a smooth legato and accurate intonation. Melba had perfect pitch; the critic Michael Aspinall says of her complete London recordings issued on LP, that there are only two lapses from pitch in the entire set. Like Patti, and unlike the more vibrant-voiced Tetrazzini, Melba's exceptional purity of tone was probably one of the principal reasons why British audiences, with their strong choral and sacred music traditions, idolised her.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's farewell to Covent Garden on 8 June 1926 was recorded by HMV, as well as broadcast. The programme included Act 2 of "Roméo et Juliette" (not recorded because the tenor Charles Hackett was not under contract to HMV), followed by the opening of Act 4 of "Otello" (Desdemona's "Willow Song" and "Ave Maria") and Acts 3 and 4 of "La bohème" (with Aurora Rettore, Browning Mummery, John Brownlee and others). The conductor was Vincenzo Bellezza. At the conclusion Lord Stanley of Alderley made a formal address and Melba gave an emotional farewell speech. In a pioneering venture, eleven sides (78rpm) were recorded via a landline to Gloucester House (London), though in the event only three of these were published. The full series (including both speeches) was included in a 1976 HMV reissue.


title: Nellie Melba

text: As was the case in many of her performances, most of Melba's recordings were made at "French Pitch" (A=435 Hz), rather than the British early 20th century standard of A=452 Hz, or the modern standard of A=440 Hz. This, and the technical inadequacies of the early recording process (discs were frequently recorded faster or slower than the supposed standard of 78rpm, whilst the conditions of the cramped recording studios – kept very warm to keep the wax at the necessary softness when cutting – would wreak havoc with instrumental tuning during recording sessions), means that playing her recordings back in the speed and pitch she made them at is not always a simple matter.


title: Nellie Melba

text: On 15 June 1920, Melba was heard in a pioneering radio broadcast from Guglielmo Marconi's New Street Works factory in Chelmsford, singing two arias and her famous trill. She was the first artist of international renown to participate in direct radio broadcasts. Radio enthusiasts across the country heard her, and the broadcast was reportedly heard from as far away as New York. People listening on the radio barely heard a few scratches of the trill and two arias she sang. Further radio broadcasts would include her Covent Garden farewell performance, and a 1927 "Empire Broadcast" (broadcast throughout the British Empire, by radio stations AWA and 2FC, Sydney, on Monday 5 September 1927; it was relayed by the BBC London on Sunday 4 September).


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1918 New Year Honours, along with May Whitty the first stage performer to receive this order, for her charity work during World War I, and was elevated to Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire in 1927. She was the first Australian to appear on the cover of "Time" magazine, in April 1927. A stained glass window commemorating Melba was erected in 1962 in the Musicians' Memorial Chapel of the church of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London. She is one of only two singers – the other being Adelina Patti – with a marble bust on the grand staircase of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.


title: Nellie Melba

text: A blue plaque commemorates Melba at Coombe House, Devey Close in Coombe, Kingston upon Thames, where she lived in 1906. She was inducted onto the Victorian Honour Roll of Women in 2001. Melba was closely associated with the Melbourne Conservatorium, and this institution was renamed the Melba Memorial Conservatorium of Music in her honour in 1956. The music hall at the University of Melbourne is known as Melba Hall. The Canberra suburb of Melba is named after her.


title: Nellie Melba

text: The Australian $100 note features the image of her face, and her likeness has also appeared on an Australian stamp. Sydney Town Hall has a marble relief bearing the inscription "Remember Melba", unveiled during a World War II charity concert in memory of Melba and her First World War charity work and patriotic concerts. A tunnel on Melbourne's EastLink freeway is named in her honour. A street in San Francisco, Melba Avenue, is also named for her.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's home in Marian, Queensland, during her brief cohabitation with her husband was relocated from the Marian Mill (where it was due to be demolished) to a riverbank setting along the main Eungella Road in Edward Lloyd Park, where, under the name Melba House, it was restored and now operates as a Melba museum and the Pioneer Valley Visitor Information Centre. Her home Coombe Cottage in Coldstream, Victoria, passed to her granddaughter Pamela, Lady Vestey (1918–2011). It is now owned by Lady Vestey's sons, Sam (3rd Baron Vestey) and Mark, who reside in the United Kingdom. The house was designed by John Harry Grainger, father of the composer Percy Grainger, and a close friend of Melba's father David Mitchell.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's name is associated with four foods, all of which were created in her honour by the French chef Auguste Escoffier:


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba planted a variety of poplar tree known as "Populus × canadensis "Aurea"", or golden poplar, on the Central Lawn in Melbourne Botanic Gardens on 11 April 1903, which has become known as "Melba's poplar". On 19 May 2011 Google celebrated her 150th birthday with a Google Doodle.


title: Nellie Melba

text: Melba's autobiography, "Melodies and Memories", was published in 1925, largely ghost-written by her secretary Beverley Nichols. Nichols later complained that Melba did not cooperate in the process of writing or by reviewing what he wrote. Full-length biographies devoted to her include those by Agnes G. Murphy (1909), John Hetherington (1967), Thérèse Radic (1986) and Ann Blainey (2009).


title: Nellie Melba

text: A novel "Evensong" by Nichols (1932) was based on aspects of Melba's life, drawing an unflattering portrait. The 1934 motion picture adaptation of "Evensong", starring Evelyn Laye as the character based on Melba, was for a time banned in Australia. Melba appears in the 1946 novel "Lucinda Brayford" by Martin Boyd. She is depicted as singing at a garden party thrown by the mother of the eponymous heroine, when she is described as having the "loveliest voice in the world".


title: Nellie Melba

text: In 1946–1947 Crawford Productions produced a popular radio series on Melba starring Glenda Raymond, who became one of the foundation singers of the Australian Opera (later Opera Australia) in 1956. In 1953 a biopic titled "Melba" was released by Horizon Pictures and directed by Lewis Milestone. Melba was played by the soprano Patrice Munsel. In 1987 the Australian Broadcasting Corporation produced a mini-series, "Melba", starring Linda Cropper miming to the singing voice of Yvonne Kenny. Melba was portrayed by Kiri Te Kanawa in episode 3 of season 4 of the British ITV television show "Downton Abbey" (2013), performing at the abbey as a guest of Lord and Lady Grantham. Rupert Christiansen, writing in "The Telegraph", bemoaned the casting and the fact checking.


title: George P. Putnam

text: George Palmer Putnam (September 7, 1887 – January 4, 1950) was an American publisher, writer and explorer. Known for his marriage to (and being the widower of) Amelia Earhart, he had also achieved fame as one of the most successful promoters in the United States during the 1930s.


title: George P. Putnam

text: George Palmer Putnam was born in Rye, New York on September 7, 1887, the son of John Bishop Putnam and the grandson of his namesake, George Palmer Putnam, founder of the prominent publishing firm that became G. P. Putnam's Sons. He studied at Harvard University and the University of California, Berkeley.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In 1911, Putnam married Dorothy Binney (1888–1982), the daughter of Edwin Binney, inventor and co-owner, with cousin C. Harold Smith, of Binney & Smith Inc., the company that made Crayola crayons. They had two sons, David Binney Putnam (1913–1992) and George Palmer Putnam, Jr. (1921-2013), and for a time lived in Bend, Oregon, where Putnam was the publisher and editor of the local newspaper, the "Bend Bulletin". He was mayor of Bend from 1912 to 1913. Putnam left Bend in 1915 to become the private secretary to Oregon Governor James Withycombe.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Within a few years, George and Dorothy moved to the East Coast, where Putnam entered the family publishing business in New York City.


title: George P. Putnam

text: During World War I, Putnam served with the United States Army field artillery. In 1926, under the sponsorship of the American Museum of Natural History, he led an expedition to the Arctic, up the west coast of Greenland. The following year he headed another expedition for the American Geographical Society to collect wildlife specimens on Baffin Island.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In July 1927 Putnam was responsible for the blockbuster publication of ""We"", Charles Lindbergh's autobiographical account of his early life and his Orteig Prize winning non-stop transatlantic solo flight from New York to Paris in May of that year. The book was one of the most successful non-fiction titles of all time, selling more than 650,000 copies in less than a year and earning its author over $250,000 ().


title: George P. Putnam

text: In 1927, Putnam's wife, Dorothy Binney, traveled to South America and began a long, well-chronicled affair with George Weymouth, a man 19 years her junior; Putnam would leave Binney two years later. Many thought that George had left his first wife for Amelia Earhart, although for Binney, it was her own ticket out of an unhappy marriage.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In 1930, the various Putnam heirs voted to merge the family's publishing firm with Minton, Balch & Co., which became the majority stockholders. George P. Putnam resigned from his position as secretary of G. P. Putnam's Sons and joined New York publishers Brewer & Warren as vice president.


title: George P. Putnam

text: A significant event in Putnam's personal and business life occurred in 1928, before the merger. Because of his reputation for working with Lindbergh, he was contacted by Amy Phipps Guest, a wealthy American living in London, who wanted to sponsor the first-ever flight by a woman across the Atlantic Ocean.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Guest asked Putnam to find a suitable candidate, and he eventually came up with the then-unknown aviator, Amelia Earhart. As it turned out, they shared many common interests: hiking, swimming, camping, riding, tennis and golf. When Putnam first met Earhart he was still married to Binney. After she completed her flight across the Atlantic, Putnam offered to help Earhart write a book about it, following the formula he had established with Lindbergh in the writing of ""WE"". The resulting Earhart book was "20 Hrs., 40 Min." (1928).


title: George P. Putnam

text: When they began writing, Putnam invited Earhart to live in his home, because he felt it would make the process easier. Shortly after, Binney left for South America. George and Dorothy divorced in 1929. Putnam had undertaken to promote Earhart in a campaign that included lecture tours and mass-market endorsements for luggage, Lucky Strike cigarettes (this caused image problems for her, and "McCall's" magazine retracted an offer) and other products.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Putnam and Earhart made their relationship official shortly after his divorce was finalized, but they didn't marry until 1931. Earhart's ideas on marriage were liberal for the time, as she believed in equal responsibilities for both "breadwinners" and pointedly kept her own surname. GP, as she called him, soon learned that he would be called "Mr. Earhart".


title: George P. Putnam

text: There was no honeymoon for the newlyweds because Earhart was involved in a nine-day cross-country tour promoting autogyros and the tour sponsor, Beech-Nut chewing gum. Although Earhart and Putnam had no children, he had two sons by his previous marriage, the explorer and writer David Binney Putnam (1913–1992) and George Palmer Putnam, Jr. (1921–2013). Earhart was especially fond of David who frequently visited his father at their family home in Rye, New York. George had contracted polio shortly after his parents' separation and was unable to visit as often.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Following Earhart's successful 1932 solo transatlantic flight, Putnam again organized her public engagements and speaking tour across the United States. Earhart joined the faculty of Purdue University College of Technology in 1935 as a visiting faculty member to counsel women on careers and as a technical advisor to the Department of Aeronautics.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Earhart disappeared in 1937 while on her second attempt to complete a circumnavigational flight of the globe. In addition to her first work, Putnam published two other books Earhart wrote about flying, "The Fun of It" (1932), a memoir of her flying experiences and an essay on women in aviation and "Last Flight" (1937), consisting of letters and memorandum compiled by Putnam after her disappearance. Putnam also published her biography in 1939 under the title "Soaring Wings: A Biography of Amelia Earhart". Although a major blaze at the Putnam residence in Rye destroyed many family treasures and Earhart's personal mementos, Putnam later donated some of Earhart's belongings, including photographs, private letters and a flight jacket, to Purdue University, where she had worked as a career counselor. Other personal effects were sent to the Women's Archives in New York.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Putnam had Earhart declared dead on January 5, 1939, and remarried on May 21 of that year to Jean-Marie Cosigny James.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In 1938, Putnam set up a new publishing company in California, George Palmer Putnam Inc. With America's entry into World War II in 1941, Putnam resumed active service, joining an intelligence unit as a captain and rising to the rank of major by 1942. In 1945, he and "Jeannie" divorced; she had initiated the action, citing incompatibility. Shortly after, he remarried again, to Margaret Havilland. They operated the Stove Pipe Wells resort in Death Valley, California.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In the book "Death Valley Handbook" (1947), Putnam was the binomial author of the plant taxon "Gilia mohavensis" . The name has since slipped into synonymy with "Linanthus mohavensis" , its basionym (or original species name).


title: George P. Putnam

text: In late 1949, Putnam fell ill at his home in the Stove Pipe Wells, California resort in Death Valley, suffering from kidney failure. He died in Trona, California on January 4, 1950, aged 62. His body was cremated and the ashes interred in the Chapel of the Pines Crematory in Los Angeles.


title: George P. Putnam

text: Amelia Earhart, Putnam's second wife, was the first president of The Ninety-Nines, an organization of (originally) 99 female pilots formed in 1929 for the support and advancement of aviation. Putnam had proposed an award as a means of honoring anyone who supports an individual member of the group (known as a "49½"), a Chapter or Section, or the organization as a whole. The "George Palmer Putnam 49½ Award" was originated to recognize such exceptional support of The Ninety-Nines.


title: George P. Putnam

text: In 1927, the Boy Scouts of America made Putnam an "Honorary Scout", a new category of Scout created that same year. This distinction was given to "American citizens whose achievements in outdoor activity, exploration and worthwhile adventure are of such an exceptional character as to capture the imagination of boys...".


title: George P. Putnam

text: Due to his relationship with Amelia Earhart, Putnam has been the subject of numerous feature and documentary films including: "Amelia Earhart" (1976) with John Forsythe portraying Putnam. In "Amelia Earhart: The Final Flight" (1994), Bruce Dern played him. The documentary "Amelia Earhart: The Price of Courage" (1993) from "American Experience" also featured the Putnam-Earhart marriage. Richard Gere portrayed Putnam in the 2009 movie, "Amelia".


title: George P. Putnam

text: In "Flying Blind", a "Nathan Heller" novel by Max Allan Collins, George Putnam is a major character, but is portrayed as a villain using Earhart for his own purposes.


title: Ecolab

text: Ecolab Inc. is an American corporation that is headquartered in Saint Paul, Minnesota. It develops and offers services, technology and systems that specialize in treatment, purification, cleaning and hygiene of water in a wide variety of applications. It helps organizations, both in private as well as public markets treat their water, for drinking use and for use in food, healthcare, hospitality-related safety and industry. Founded as Economics Laboratory in 1923 by Merritt J. Osborn, it was eventually renamed "Ecolab" in 1986.


title: Ecolab

text: Merritt J. "M.J." Osborn founded Economics Laboratory in 1923 with the tagline "Saving time, lightening labor and reducing costs to those we serve." The company's original product was Absorbit, a product supposedly designed to quickly clean carpets in hotel rooms. This was soon followed by Soilax, a dishwasher soap.


title: Ecolab

text: During the 1930s, the company expanded throughout the United States and sales reached US$5.4 million by the end of 1940s. It acquired the Magnus Company in the early 1950s, which gave the company access to Magnus's industrial specialty businesses - including pulp and paper, metalworking, transportation, and petrochemical processing.


title: Ecolab

text: In the 1950s, international expansion of Economics Laboratory started with the establishment of its first overseas subsidiary in Sweden in 1956. It became a publicly traded corporation in 1957 and continued to expand during the 1960s and 1970s. In 1979, it acquired Apollo Technologies, but in 1983 the acquired Apollo subsidiary was shut down. In 1984, Ecolab acquired pest elimination leader Lystads, Inc., of Grand Forks, North Dakota.


title: Ecolab

text: In 1986, the company changed its name from Economics Laboratory to Ecolab Inc. and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange.


title: Ecolab

text: In 1987, Ecolab purchased the lawncare servicer provider ChemLawn for US$376 million. It sold the acquisition in 1992 to ServiceMaster for US$103 million as it couldn't turn ChemLawn into a profitable business.


title: Ecolab

text: Ecolab and the German fast-moving consumer goods firm Henkel KGaA formed a 50:50 European joint venture called 'Henkel-Ecolab' in 1991 to expand into European and Russian markets.


title: Ecolab

text: Ecolab continued to acquire companies in the 1990s, including Kay Chemical (1993), Australia-based Gibson Chemical Industries Ltd (1997), and GCS Service Inc (1998).


title: Ecolab

text: In the mid-2000s, strategic acquisitions continued, and Ecolab diversified its portfolio of customer offerings by venturing into the food safety management business as well as a healthcare business unit.


title: Ecolab

text: In 2004, Douglas M. Baker, Jr. was named chief executive officer. In 2006, he also was named chairman of Ecolab's board of directors.


title: Ecolab

text: In 2005, the company opened a new global research, development, and engineering center in Eagan, Minnesota.


title: Ecolab

text: In 2006, Ecolab won the Black Pearl Award for Corporate Excellence in Food Safety and Quality, presented by the International Association of Food Protection (IAFP).


title: Ecolab

text: In 2007, Ecolab acquired Microtek Medical Holdings, Inc., expanding its infection prevention expertise and offerings to hospitals and other healthcare facilities.


title: Ecolab

text: In 2008, Henkel sold all of the 73 million shares, nearly a 29.5% stake it held in Ecolab, ending the two-decade-long partnership. The same year, Ecolab established Zurich as its Europe, the Middle East and Africa headquarters.


title: Ecolab

text: In July 2011, Ecolab announced a merger with Nalco Holding Company, Inc., an industrial water technology firm. In December 2011, Nalco, later renamed Nalco Water, became a wholly owned subsidiary of Ecolab after Ecolab completed the US$5.4 billion acquisition.


title: Ecolab

text: In May 2012, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, through his investment vehicles Cascade Investment and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation increased his stake of 10.8% in Ecolab to 25%.


title: Ecolab

text: In August 2012, Ecolab opened its Taicang, China, manufacturing plant. The facility, one of the company's largest, helped expand Ecolab's presence in Greater China and was the company's first plant to recycle 100% of its wastewater.


title: Ecolab

text: In October 2012, Ecolab entered an agreement to acquire Champion Technologies, a global specialty chemical company. The $2.2 billion transaction closed in April 2013.


title: Ecolab

text: In November 2014, Ecolab, working with TruCost, launched the Water Risk Monetizer. It provides an online, no-cost financial modeling tool to assess and monetize the risk of water scarcity. In November 2015, for $40.5 million, Ecolab acquired the U.S. operations of Swisher Hygiene, which provides hygiene and sanitizing solutions for the foodservice, hospitality, retail and healthcare markets.


title: Ecolab

text: In June 2016, Ecolab announced plans to acquire Laboratoires Anios, a leading European manufacturer and marketer of hygiene and disinfection products for the healthcare, food service, and food and beverage markets. Based in Lille, France, Anios served customers in 85 countries and had 2015 sales of approximately US$245 million. The US$800 million transaction closed on February 1, 2017.


title: Ecolab

text: In July 2016, Ecolab made a minority investment in Aquatech International, LLC of an undisclosed amount.


title: Ecolab

text: In October 2016, Ecolab acquired the assets of UltraClenz, a developer of electronic hand hygiene compliance monitoring systems and dispensers.


title: Ecolab

text: In March 2018, Bill Gates purchased $230 million in additional shares of Ecolab via Cascade Investments.


title: Ecolab

text: In August 2022, Bill Gates purchased additional stock through Cascade, though his overall stake dropped to 11%.


title: Ecolab

text: Ecolab employs approximately 47,000 people and operates in more than 170 countries. It is organized in the following geographical divisions:


title: Ecolab

text: Ecolab helps organizations treat their water, not only for drinking directly, but also for use in food, healthcare, hospitality and industry.


title: Ecolab

text: The company's food safety services provide consulting to restaurants, hospitals, food retailers and food & beverage manufacturing facilities. It is also a supplier of chemistries used by beef and poultry processors to reduce pathogens, such as E. coli and salmonella in uncooked beef and poultry.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: The ShinMaywa US-2 is a large Japanese short takeoff and landing amphibious aircraft developed and manufactured by seaplane specialist ShinMaywa (formerly "Shin Meiwa"). It was developed from the earlier Shin Meiwa US-1A seaplane, which was introduced during the 1970s.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: The ShinMaywa US-2 was developed on behalf of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) as a 'like-for-like' replacement for its aging US-1A fleet. In Japanese service, it is operated in the air-sea rescue (ASR) role. The US-2 can also be used in other capacities, such as an aerial fire fighter, carrying 15 tonnes of water for this mission. Various overseas operators have held discussions on potential acquisitions of the type, including the Indian Navy and Indian Coast Guard. Other countries such as the United States, Indonesia, Thailand, and Greece have also shown interest in the US-2 for various purposes.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: During 1969, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) issued a production order to Japanese seaplane manufacturer Shin Meiwa for a group of 21 anti-submarine aircraft, which were given the designation PS-1. The service had also opted to procure a variant of the type, designated US-1A, specifically for search-and-rescue (SAR). The US-1A was Japan's first amphibian - capable of being used on land and sea.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: During the 1990s when the US-1A fleet was beginning to show its age, the JMSDF attempted to obtain funding towards acquiring a replacement, but could not secure enough to develop an entirely new aircraft. Therefore, during 1995, ShinMaywa, as Shin Meiwa had been renamed (reportedly so that the name would be easier to pronounce for non-Japanese speakers) commenced work on a project to develop an upgraded and modernised version of the US-1A, initially referred to as the US-1A "kai" (US-1A 改 - meaning "improved US-1A"). This modified aircraft features numerous aerodynamic refinements over its predecessor, along with a pressurised hull, and the adoption of more powerful Rolls-Royce AE 2100 engines and electronic cockpit instrumentation. The JMSDF also listed various refinements for the amphibian, including improved handling while landing on water, better onboard patient transfer facilities, and improved search-and-rescue capabilities at sea.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: On 18 December 2003, flight testing of the type, which was subsequently designated as the US-2, commenced. During early 2007, ShinMaywa formally launched commercial production of the amphibian. Production is handled by several of Japan's aviation companies. Mitsubishi manufactures the outer wing sections and the rear part of the engine nacelles, while NIPPI Corporation builds the watertight landing gear housings, and Kawasaki Heavy Industries produces the cockpit. Final assembly is performed by ShinMaywa around the US-2's hull. The production line only has the capacity to produce two aircraft at a time. During 2009, the first production US-2, which was outfitted for the search and rescue mission, was delivered to the Japan's Ministry of Defense.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: In 2010, ShinMaywa unveiled specifications for a civil fire-fighting variant of its US-2 amphibian. It began marketing the new variant to potential overseas customers that same year. The fire-fighting model replaces one fuel tank with a 15 tonne water tank, reducing its maximum range to 2,300 km (1,245 nm) compared with the SAR's 4,700 km range. The tank is durable enough for salt water, foam and fire retardant. Other features include a pair of water scoops for collecting water, automatic foam mixing equipment and a computer-controlled water drop system.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: The JMSDF intends to purchase up to 14 US-2s for its search and rescue needs. The type is currently operated by the 31st Fleet Air Wing (71st Air Force, 71st Flight Squadron) of the JMSDF from both Iwakuni Air Base and Atsugi Air Base. The introduction of the US-2 has enabled the withdrawal of the US-1A, the last of which performed its final flight during December 2017.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: During April 2015, aircraft 9905 was involved in an accident. The aircraft was on a training mission near Cape Ashizuri in Shikoku and four crew members were injured. By November 2018, a total of six US-2s had been delivered while a further two aircraft were under production.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: Since the early 2010s, the Indian Navy has an established requirement for between 12 and 18 US-2 amphibians configured as search and rescue aircraft at an anticipated cost of US$1.65 billion. The Indian Coast Guard has also shown interest in procuring three aircraft for its own purposes. It is expected that, if procured, several of these amphibians would be stationed in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Indian authorities have reportedly been keen to have the US-2 assembled in India via a licensing arrangement. Performing final assembly of the aircraft locally is expected to cost 25% less than in Japan. Negotiations between the two nations commenced during 2011.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: The process of finalising purchase arrangements for the aircraft, which would represent the first sale of military equipment by Japan to India since the Second World War, have been protracted. During October 2016, ShinMaywa announced that it had reduced the offered price to around US$113 million per aircraft. At one point, there were expectations that Japan and India would be signing a contract for the US-2 purchase during November 2016. The decision was deferred by Indian defence minister Manohar Parrikar. During March 2018, Japanese ambassador to India Kenji Hiramatsu informed "The Hindu Business Line" that talks between the two nations were still in progress. During April 2018, ShinMaywa signed a memorandum of understanding with Indian conglomerate Mahindra Group in support of future Indian sales.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: Another prospective customer is Indonesia, which has been reportedly concerned by a growing Chinese military presence across the islands of the South China Sea. It has been speculated that Indonesia could be a key partner in the production of the US-2, potentially competing with India for workshare in the programme. Reportedly, without implementing outsourced production, ShinMaywa is unlikely to be unable to promptly fulfil the needs of a third customer due to its limited production capacity.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: There have also been reports that Thailand is interested in purchasing a number of US-2s as maritime patrol aircraft. The nation is reportedly seeking to bolster its surveillance and anti-submarine warfare capabilities while developing deeper defense ties between itself and Japan.


title: ShinMaywa US-2

text: Following a series of deadly fires in the Attica region of Greece circa July 2018, the Greek government reportedly sought to order several US-2s to replace their aging firefighting fleet. If the sale is completed, it would be the first major defense procurement by Greece from a Japanese supplier.


title: Desi Lydic

text: Lani Desmonet Lydic ( ; born June 30, 1981) is an American comedian and actress who is a correspondent on "The Daily Show" with Trevor Noah. From 2011 to 2016, she starred as guidance counselor Valerie Marks on the MTV comedy-drama series "Awkward". She got her start in the 2001 parody film "Not Another Teen Movie". She also starred in the Spike miniseries "Invasion Iowa" alongside William Shatner, and the parody series "The Real Wedding Crashers". She appeared as Shea Seger in the 2011 film "We Bought a Zoo" alongside Matt Damon and Scarlett Johansson, and in the 2013 film "The Babymakers" with Olivia Munn. Lydic also appeared as one half of a lesbian couple on an episode of the Disney Channel series "Good Luck Charlie" in 2014. She joined Trevor Noah's lineup of correspondents for "The Daily Show" on September 29, 2015.


title: Desi Lydic

text: Lydic was born in Louisville, Kentucky. At age of 3, Lydic became enamored of comedic acting from watching Carol Burnett play Miss Agatha Hannigan in Annie. As a child, she enrolled in the Young Actors Institute at the Youth Performing Arts School and starred in a Kroger commercial. She later moved to Los Angeles and became an improvisational actor, performing at The Groundlings and Improv Olympic.


title: Desi Lydic

text: On The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Desi Lydic sees herself as a comedic actor with "a journalistic responsibility" to the truth, in regards to the serious topics she approaches through a humorous lens, as a correspondent for the show. Lydic created her first one-hour special which aired on May 13, 2019 on Comedy Central, and was entitled "The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Presents Desi Lydic: Abroad". The special explores how the United States is now further apart in gender equality than many other countries in the world. The special was nominated for a Writers Guild Award. After the passing of US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Desi Lydic paid tribute to her work, and life in a half-hour special entitled "The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Presents: Remembering RBG – A Nation Ugly Cries with Desi Lydic" aired on Comedy Central on October 30, 2020.


title: Desi Lydic

text: Lydic has one son with her husband Gannon Brousseau named Brixton, who was born in late December 2015. While filming her Comedy Central special "Abroad" Lydic was "gifted" a "small upside-down triangle tattoo representing female empowerment" as a commemoration of her time spent with Icelandic all-female rap collective Daughters of Reykjavík. The tattoo marked her as the 23rd member of the group.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: The Karakurt class, Russian designation Project 22800 "Karakurt" ( European Black Widow), is a new class of Russian corvettes (small missile ships in Russian classification) which have been entering service with the Russian Navy since 2018.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: The class is intended as a more seaworthy, blue-water complement to the Buyan-M class corvettes, designed for the littoral zone and which serve in Russia's Caspian Flotilla, Baltic Fleet and Black Sea Fleet.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: The ships are designed to be armed with Kalibr or Oniks anti-ship cruise missiles and have an endurance of 15 days. They are also to be a cheap alternative for larger frigates, for which construction was delayed due to the suspended military cooperation with Ukraine, and because of Russia's intention to continue the modernization of its navy until all necessary tasks for construction of larger vessels domestically are solved. Nevertheless, delays in the supply of domestically-produced engines for the Karakurt-class have held up the completion of several units. Additionally, the threat of international sanctions reportedly disrupted construction of this class of vessel at the Morye shipyard in Feodosia, Crimea.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: Project 22800 was first publicly presented by Almaz during the International Military-Technical Forum «ARMY-2015», held in Kubinka. At the time, the class was presented yet as "Project 12300". During the exhibition, it was also announced 18 ships are planned for construction.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: The first two ships, "Uragan" and "Taifun" (now "Mytishchi" and "Sovetsk"), were laid down at the Pella Shipyard in Saint Petersburg on 24 December 2015.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: In August 2016, it was reported that a total of seven ships have been ordered from the Pella Shipyard (one of which would be built at More Shipyard, Feodosia), and that five more ships have been ordered from the Zelenodolsk Shipyard. Three of the five ordered ships, "Cyclone", "Askold" and "Amur", previously planned to be built by the Zelenodolsk Shipyard, were later laid down at the Zaliv Shipyard in Kerch.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: The Russian Defence Ministry signed a contract for several more vessels during the International Military-Technical Forum «ARMY-2017».


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: During the International Military-Technical Forum «ARMY-2018», the Russian Defence Ministry signed two contracts for construction of another six vessels. Two ships of the order would be built by the Vostochnaya Verf, Vladivostok and four ships by the Amur Shipyard, Komsomolsk-on-Amur.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: On 16 October 2018, "Mytishchi" began state tests in the White Sea, and was officially accepted into service on 17 December 2018.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: Project 22800 derives from Project 12300 "Skorpion", a proposed 1990s Almaz design for a 500-ton displacement missile boat, and was also heavily influenced by Project 21631, the Buyan-M corvettes. Ships of the class have a stealth shaped superstructure with an integrated mast carrying four phased array radar panels. The primary armament consists of Kalibr cruise missiles or P-800 Oniks supersonic anti-ship missiles carried in eight UKSK VLS cells in the rear part of the superstructure, behind the bridge. The corvettes built for the Russian Navy will be equipped with a 76.2 mm AK-176MA automatic dual-purpose gun, a modernized version of the AK-176. However, at least on the first ship, the 100 mm A-190 was installed. A proposed export version may carry the Italian OTO Melara 76 mm gun. For anti-missile defense, the first two ships will only carry a pair of AK-630M gun-based CIWS.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: Starting from the third ship, they will be equipped with Pantsir-M, a navalized version of the Pantsir surface-to-air missile system. The third vessel of the class, "Odintsovo", entered service in the Baltic Fleet with the Pantsir-M system in November 2020. The project 22800 is not designed for anti-submarine warfare.


title: Karakurt-class corvette

text: In November 2022, an arbitration court in Moscow held the first preliminary hearing for a lawsuit against Pella Shipyard (Pella) of St Petersburg, in which the Russian Defence Ministry is seeking 1.4 billion Rubles (US$23.1 million) over allegations the company was “failing to fulfill supply contracts.”


title: Impulsivity

text: In psychology, impulsivity (or impulsiveness) is a tendency to act on a whim, displaying behavior characterized by little or no forethought, reflection, or consideration of the consequences. Impulsive actions are typically "poorly conceived, prematurely expressed, unduly risky, or inappropriate to the situation that often result in undesirable consequences," which imperil long-term goals and strategies for success. Impulsivity can be classified as a multifactorial construct. A functional variety of impulsivity has also been suggested, which involves action without much forethought in appropriate situations that can and does result in desirable consequences. "When such actions have positive outcomes, they tend not to be seen as signs of impulsivity, but as indicators of boldness, quickness, spontaneity, courageousness, or unconventionality" Thus, the construct of impulsivity includes at least two independent components: first, acting without an appropriate amount of deliberation, which may or may not be functional; and second, choosing short-term gains over long-term ones.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsivity is both a facet of personality and a major component of various disorders, including FASD, ADHD, substance use disorders, bipolar disorder, antisocial personality disorder, and borderline personality disorder. Abnormal patterns of impulsivity have also been noted instances of acquired brain injury and neurodegenerative diseases. Neurobiological findings suggest that there are specific brain regions involved in impulsive behavior, although different brain networks may contribute to different manifestations of impulsivity, and that genetics may play a role.


title: Impulsivity

text: Many actions contain both impulsive and compulsive features, but impulsivity and compulsivity are functionally distinct. Impulsivity and compulsivity are interrelated in that each exhibits a tendency to act prematurely or without considered thought and often include negative outcomes. Compulsivity may be on a continuum with compulsivity on one end and impulsivity on the other, but research has been contradictory on this point. Compulsivity occurs in response to a perceived risk or threat, impulsivity occurs in response to a perceived immediate gain or benefit, and, whereas compulsivity involves repetitive actions, impulsivity involves unplanned reactions.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsivity is a common feature of the conditions of gambling and alcohol addiction. Research has shown that individuals with either of these addictions discount delayed money at higher rates than those without, and that the presence of gambling and alcohol abuse lead to additive effects on discounting.


title: Impulsivity

text: An impulse is a wish or urge, particularly a sudden one. It can be considered as a normal and fundamental part of human thought processes, but also one that can become problematic, as in a condition like obsessive-compulsive disorder, borderline personality disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or in fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.


title: Impulsivity

text: The ability to control impulses, or more specifically control the desire to act on them, is an important factor in personality and socialization. Deferred gratification, also known as impulse control is an example of this, concerning impulses primarily relating to things that a person wants or desires. Delayed gratification comes when one avoids acting on initial impulses. Delayed gratification has been studied in relation to childhood obesity. Resisting the urge to act on impulses is important to teach children, because it teaches the value of delayed gratification.


title: Impulsivity

text: For many years it was understood that impulsivity is a trait but with further analysis it can be found that there were five traits that can lead to impulsive actions:


title: Impulsivity

text: Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a multiple component disorder involving inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR) breaks ADHD into three subtypes according to the behavioral symptoms:


title: Impulsivity

text: blurting out inappropriate comments, showing their emotions without restraint, and act without regard for consequences.


title: Impulsivity

text: Prevalence of the disorder worldwide is estimated to be between 4% and 10%, with reports as low as 2.2% and as high as 17.8%. Variation in rate of diagnoses may be attributed to differences between populations (i.e. culture), and differences in diagnostic methodologies. Prevalence of ADHD among females is less than half that of males, and females more commonly fall into the inattentive subtype.


title: Impulsivity

text: Despite an upward trend in diagnoses of the inattentive subtype of ADHD, impulsivity is commonly considered to be the central feature of ADHD, and the impulsive and combined subtypes are the major contributors to the societal costs associated with ADHD. The estimated cost of illness for a child with ADHD is $14,576 (in 2005 dollars) annually. Prevalence of ADHD among prison populations is significantly higher than that of the normal population.


title: Impulsivity

text: In both adults and children, ADHD has a high rate of comorbidity with other mental health disorders such as learning disability, conduct disorder, anxiety disorder, major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and substance use disorders.


title: Impulsivity

text: The precise genetic and environmental factors contributing to ADHD are relatively unknown, but endophenotypes offer a potential middle ground between genes and symptoms. ADHD is commonly linked to "core" deficits involving "executive function," "delay aversion," or "activation/arousal" theories that attempt to explain ADHD through its symptomology. Endophenotypes, on the other hand, purport to identify potential behavioral markers that correlate with specific genetic etiology. There is some evidence to support deficits in response inhibition as one such marker. Problems inhibiting prepotent responses are linked with deficits in pre-frontal cortex (PFC) functioning, which is a common dysfunction associated with ADHD and other impulse-control disorders.


title: Impulsivity

text: The acquisition phase of substance abuse involves the escalation from single use to regular use. Impulsivity may be related to the acquisition of substance abuse because of the potential role that instant gratification provided by the substance may offset the larger future benefits of abstaining from the substance, and because people with impaired inhibitory control may not be able to overcome motivating environmental cues, such as peer pressure. "Similarly, individuals that discount the value of delayed reinforcers begin to abuse alcohol, marijuana, and cigarettes early in life, while also abusing a wider array of illicit drugs compared to those who discounted delayed reinforcers less."


title: Impulsivity

text: Escalation or dysregulation is the next and more severe phase of substance abuse. In this phase individuals "lose control" of their addiction with large levels of drug consumption and binge drug use. Animal studies suggest that individuals with higher levels of impulsivity may be more prone to the escalation stage of substance abuse.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsivity is also related to the abstinence, relapse, and treatment stages of substance abuse. People who scored high on the Barratt Impulsivity Scale (BIS) were more likely to stop treatment for cocaine abuse. Additionally, they adhered to treatment for a shorter duration than people that scored low on impulsivity. Also, impulsive people had greater cravings for drugs during withdrawal periods and were more likely to relapse. This effect was shown in a study where smokers that test high on the BIS had increased craving in response to smoking cues, and gave into the cravings more quickly than less impulsive smokers. Taken as a whole the current research suggests that impulsive individuals are less likely to abstain from drugs and more likely to relapse earlier than less impulsive individuals.


title: Impulsivity

text: While it is important to note the effect of impulsivity on substance abuse, the reciprocating effect whereby substance abuse can increase impulsivity has also been researched and documented. The promoting effect of impulsivity on substance abuse and the effect of substance abuse on increased impulsivity creates a positive feedback loop that maintains substance seeking behaviors. It also makes conclusions about the direction of causality difficult. This phenomenon has been shown to be related to several substances, but not all. For example, alcohol has been shown to increase impulsivity while amphetamines have had mixed results.


title: Impulsivity

text: Substance use disorder treatments include prescription of medications such as acamprosate, buprenorphine, disulfiram, LAAM, methadone, and naltrexone, as well as effective psychotherapeutic treatment like


title: Impulsivity

text: behavioral couples therapy, CBT, contingency management, motivational enhancement therapy, and relapse prevention.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsive overeating spans from an episode of indulgence by an otherwise healthy person to chronic binges by a person with an eating disorder.


title: Impulsivity

text: Consumption of a tempting food by non-clinical individuals increases when self-regulatory resources are previously depleted by another task, suggesting that it is caused by a breakdown in self control. Impulsive eating of unhealthy snack foods appears to be regulated by individual differences in impulsivity when self-control is weak and by attitudes towards the snack and towards healthy eating when self-control is strong. There is also evidence that greater food consumption occurs when people are in a sad mood, although it is possible that this is due more to emotional regulation than to a lack of self-control. In these cases, overeating will only take place if the food is palatable to the person, and if so individual differences in impulsivity can predict the amount of consumption.


title: Impulsivity

text: Chronic overeating is a behavioral component of binge eating disorder, compulsive overeating, and bulimia nervosa. These diseases are more common for women and may involve eating thousands of calories at a time. Depending on which of these disorders is the underlying cause, an episode of overeating can have a variety of different motivations. Characteristics common among these three disorders include low self-esteem, depression, eating when not physically hungry, preoccupation with food, eating alone due to embarrassment, and feelings of regret or disgust after an episode. In these cases, overeating is not limited to palatable foods.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsivity differentially affects disorders involving the overcontrol of food intake (such as anorexia nervosa) and disorders involving the lack of control of food intake (such as bulimia nervosa). Cognitive impulsivity, such as risk-taking, is a component of many eating disorders, including those that are restrictive. However, only people with disorders involving episodes of overeating have elevated levels of motoric impulsivity, such as reduced response inhibition capacity.


title: Impulsivity

text: One theory suggests that binging provides a short-term escape from feelings of sadness, anger, or boredom, although it may contribute to these negative emotions in the long-term. Another theory suggests that binge eating involves reward seeking, as evidenced by decreased serotonin binding receptors of binge-eating women compared to matched-weight controls and predictive value of heightened reward sensitivity/drive in dysfunctional eating.


title: Impulsivity

text: Treatments for clinical-grade overeating include cognitive behavioral therapy to teach people how to track and change their eating habits and actions, interpersonal psychotherapy to help people analyze the contribution of their friends and family in their disorder, and pharmacological therapies including antidepressants and SSRIs.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulse buying consists of purchasing a product or service without any previous intent to make that purchase. It has been speculated to account for as much as eighty percent of all purchases in the United States.


title: Impulsivity

text: There are several theories pertaining to impulsive buying. One theory suggests that it is exposure combining with the speed that a reward can be obtained that influences an individual to choose lesser immediate rewards over greater rewards that can be obtained later. For example, a person might choose to buy a candy bar because they are in the candy aisle even though they had decided earlier that they would not buy candy while in the store.


title: Impulsivity

text: Another theory is one of self-regulation which suggests that the capacity to refrain from impulsive buying is a finite resource. As this capacity is depleted with repeated acts of restraint susceptibility to purchasing other items on impulse increases.


title: Impulsivity

text: Finally, a third theory suggests an emotional and behavioral tie between the purchaser and the product which drives both the likelihood of an impulsive purchase as well as the degree that a person will retroactively be satisfied with that purchase result. Some studies have shown a large number of individuals are happy with purchases made on impulse (41% in one study) which is explained as a preexisting emotional attachment which has a positive relationship both with the likelihood of initiating the purchase as well as mitigating post purchase satisfaction. As an example, when purchasing team-related college paraphernalia a large percentage of those purchases are made on impulse and are tied to the degree with which a person has positive ties to that team.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsive buying is seen both as an individual trait in which each person has a preconditioned or hereditary allotment, as well as a situational construct which is mitigated by such things as emotion in the moment of the purchase and the preconditioned ties an individual has with the product.


title: Impulsivity

text: Psychotherapy and pharmacological treatments have been shown to be helpful interventions for patients with impulsive-compulsive buying disorder.


title: Impulsivity

text: Psychotherapy interventions include the use of desensitization techniques, self-help books or attending a support group.


title: Impulsivity

text: Pharmacological interventions include the use of SSRIs, such as fluvoxamine, citalopram, escitalopram, and naltrexone.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulse control disorder (ICDs) are a class of DSM diagnoses that do not fall into the other diagnostic categories of the manual (e.g. substance use disorders), and that are characterized by extreme difficulty controlling impulses or urges despite negative consequences. Individuals suffering from an impulse control disorder frequently experience five stages of symptoms: compelling urge or desire, failure to resist the urge, a heightened sense of arousal, succumbing to the urge (which usually yields relief from tension), and potential remorse or feelings of guilt after the behavior is completed. Specific disorders included within this category include intermittent explosive disorder, kleptomania, pathological gambling, pyromania, trichotillomania (hair-pulling disorder), and impulse control disorders not otherwise specified (ICD NOS). ICD NOS includes other significant difficulties that seem to be related to impulsivity but do not meet the criteria for a specific DSM diagnosis.


title: Impulsivity

text: There has been much debate over whether or not the ICDs deserve a diagnostic category of their own, or whether they are in fact phenomenologically and epidemiologically related to other major psychiatric conditions like obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), affective disorders, and addictive disorders. In fact, the ICD classification is likely to change with the release of the DSM-V in May 2013. In this new revision the ICD NOS will likely be reduced or removed; proposed revisions include reclassifying trichotillomania (to be renamed hair-pulling disorder) and skin-picking disorder as obsessive-compulsive and related disorders, moving intermittent explosive disorder under the diagnostic heading of disruptive, impulse control, and conduct disorders, and gambling disorder may be included in addiction and related disorders.


title: Impulsivity

text: The role of impulsivity in the ICDs varies. Research on kleptomania and pyromania is lacking, though there is some evidence that greater kleptomania severity is tied to poor executive functioning.


title: Impulsivity

text: Trichotillomania and skin-picking disorder seem to be disorders that primarily involve motor impulsivity, and will likely be classified in the DSM-V within the obsessive-compulsive and related disorders category.


title: Impulsivity

text: Pathological gambling, in contrast, seems to involve many diverse aspects of impulsivity and abnormal reward circuitry (similar to substance use disorders) that has led to it being increasingly conceptualized as a non-substance or behavioral addiction. Evidence elucidating the role of impulsivity in pathological gambling is accumulating, with pathological gambling samples demonstrating greater response impulsivity, choice impulsivity, and reflection impulsivity than comparison control samples. Additionally, pathological gamblers tend to demonstrate greater response perseveration (compulsivity) and risky decisionmaking in laboratory gambling tasks compared to controls, though there is no strong evidence suggesting that attention and working memory are impaired in pathological gamblers. These relations between impulsivity and pathological gambling are confirmed by brain function research: pathological gamblers demonstrate less activation in the frontal cortical regions (implicated in impulsivity) compared to controls during behavioral tasks tapping response impulsivity, compulsivity, and risk/reward. Preliminary, though variable, findings also suggest that striatal activation is different between gamblers and controls, and that neurotransmitter differences (e.g. dopamine, serotonin, opioids, glutamate, norepinephrine) may exist as well.


title: Impulsivity

text: Individuals with intermittent explosive disorder, also known as impulsive aggression, have exhibited serotonergic abnormalities and show differential activation in response to emotional stimuli and situations. Notably, intermittent explosive disorder is not associated with a higher likelihood of diagnosis with any of the other ICDs but is highly comorbid with disruptive behavior disorders in childhood. Intermittent explosive disorder is likely to be re-classified in the DSM-V under the heading of disruptive, impulse control, and conduct disorders.


title: Impulsivity

text: These sorts of impulse control disorders are most often treated using certain types of psychopharamcological interventions (e.g. antidepressants) and behavioral treatments like cognitive behavioral therapy.


title: Impulsivity

text: According to the ego (or cognitive) depletion theory of impulsivity, self-control refers to the capacity for altering one's own responses, especially to bring them into line with standards such as ideals, values, morals, and social expectations, and to support the pursuit of long-term goals. Self-control enables a person to restrain or override one response, thereby making a different response possible.


title: Impulsivity

text: A major tenet of the theory is that engaging in acts of self-control draws from a limited "reservoir" of self-control that, when depleted, results in reduced capacity for further self-regulation. Self-control is viewed as analogous to a muscle: Just as a muscle requires strength and energy to exert force over a period of time, acts that have high self-control demands also require strength and energy to perform. Similarly, as muscles become fatigued after a period of sustained exertion and have reduced capacity to exert further force, self-control can also become depleted when demands are made of self-control resources over a period of time. Baumeister and colleagues termed the state of diminished self-control strength ego depletion (or cognitive depletion).


title: Impulsivity

text: Empirical tests of the ego-depletion effect typically adopt dual-task paradigm. Participants assigned to an experimental ego-depletion group are required to engage in two consecutive tasks requiring self-control. Control participants are also required to engage in two consecutive tasks, but only the second task requires self-control. The strength model predicts that the performance of the experimental-group on the second self-control task will be impaired relative to that of the control group. This is because the finite self-control resources of the experimental participants will be diminished after the initial self-control task, leaving little to draw on for the second task.


title: Impulsivity

text: The effects of ego depletion do not appear to be a product of mood or arousal. In most studies, mood and arousal has not been found to differ between participants who exerted self-control and those who did not. Likewise, mood and arousal was not related to final self-control performance. The same is true for more specific mood items, such as frustration, irritation, annoyance, boredom, or interest as well. Feedback about success and failure of the self-control efforts does not appear to affect performance. In short, the decline in self-control performance after exerting self-control appears to be directly related to the amount of self-control exerted and cannot be easily explained by other, well-established psychological processes.


title: Impulsivity

text: Dual process theory states that mental processes operate in two separate classes: automatic and controlled. In general, automatic processes are those that are experiential in nature, occur without involving higher levels of cognition, and are based on prior experiences or informal heuristics. Controlled decisions are effortful and largely conscious processes in which an individual weighs alternatives and makes a more deliberate decision.


title: Impulsivity

text: Dual process theories at one time considered any single action/thought as either being automatic or controlled. However, currently they are seen as operating more along a continuum as most impulsive actions will have both controlled and automatic attributes. Automatic processes are classified according to whether they are meant to inhibit or to facilitate a thought process. For example, in one study researchers offered individuals a choice between a 1 in 10 chance of winning a prize and a 10 in 100 chance. Many participants chose one of the choices over the other without identifying that the chances inherent in each were the same as they saw either only 10 chances total as more beneficial, or of having 10 chances to win as more beneficial. In effect impulsive decisions can be made as prior information and experiences dictate one of the courses of action is more beneficial when in actuality careful consideration would better enable the individual to make a more informed and improved decision.


title: Impulsivity

text: Intertemporal choice is defined as "decisions with consequences that play out over time". This is often assessed using the relative value people assign to rewards at different points in time, either by asking experimental subjects to choose between alternatives or examining behavioral choices in a naturalistic setting.


title: Impulsivity

text: Intertemporal choice is commonly measured in the laboratory using a "delayed discounting" paradigm, which measures the process of devaluing rewards and punishments that happen in the future. In this paradigm, subjects must choose between a smaller reward delivered soon and a larger reward delivered at a delay in the future. Choosing the smaller-sooner reward is considered impulsive. By repeatedly making these choices, indifference points can be estimated. For example, if someone chose $70 now over $100 in a week, but chose the $100 in a week over $60 now, it can be inferred that they are indifferent between $100 in a week and an intermediate value between $60 and $70. A delay discounting curve can be obtained for each participant by plotting their indifference points with different reward amounts and time delays. Individual differences in discounting curves are affected by personality characteristics such as self-reports of impulsivity and locus of control; personal characteristics such as age, gender, IQ, race, and culture; socioeconomic characteristics such as income and education; and many other variables. to drug addiction. Lesions of the nucleus accumbens core subregion or basolateral amygdala produce shifts towards choosing the smaller-sooner reward, suggesting the involvement of these brain regions in the preference for delayed reinforcers. There is also evidence that the orbitofrontal cortex is involved in delay discounting, although there is currently debate on whether lesions in this region result in more or less impulsivity.


title: Impulsivity

text: Economic theory suggests that optimal discounting involves the exponential discounting of value over time. This model assumes that people and institutions should discount the value of rewards and punishments at a constant rate according to how delayed they are in time. While economically rational, recent evidence suggests that people and animals do not discount exponentially. Many studies suggest that humans and animals discount future values according to a hyperbolic discounting curve where the discount factor decreases with the length of the delay (for example, waiting from today to tomorrow involves more loss of value than waiting from twenty days to twenty-one days). Further evidence for non-constant delay discounting is suggested by the differential involvement of various brain regions in evaluating immediate versus delayed consequences. Specifically, the prefrontal cortex is activated when choosing between rewards at a short delay or a long delay, but regions associated with the dopamine system are additionally activated when the option of an immediate reinforcer is added. Additionally, intertemporal choices differ from economic models because they involve anticipation (which may involve a neurological "reward" even if the reinforcer is delayed), self-control (and the breakdown of it when faced with temptations), and representation (how the choice is framed may influence desirability of the reinforcer), none of which are accounted for by a model that assumes economic rationality.


title: Impulsivity

text: One facet of intertemporal choice is the possibility for preference reversal, when a tempting reward becomes more highly valued than abstaining only when immediately available. For example, when sitting home alone, a person may report that they value the health benefit of not smoking a cigarette over the effect of smoking one. However, later at night when the cigarette is immediately available, their subjective value of the cigarette may rise and they may choose to smoke it.


title: Impulsivity

text: A theory called the "primrose path" is intended to explain how preference reversal can lead to addiction in the long run. As an example, a lifetime of sobriety may be more highly valued than a lifetime of alcoholism, but, at the same time, one drink now may be more highly valued than not drinking now. Because it is always "now," the drink is always chosen, and a paradoxical effect occurs whereby the more-valued long-term alternative is not achieved because the more-valued short-term alternative is always chosen. This is an example of complex ambivalence, when a choice is made not between two concrete alternatives but between one immediate and tangible alternative (i.e. having a drink) and one delayed and abstract alternative (i.e. sobriety).


title: Impulsivity

text: Similarities between humans and non-human animals in intertemporal choice have been studied. Pigeons and rats also discount hyperbolically; tamarin monkeys do not wait more than eight seconds to triple the amount of a food reward. The question arises as to whether this is a difference of homology or analogy—that is, whether the same underlying process underlies human-animal similarities or whether different processes are manifesting in similar patterns of results.


title: Impulsivity

text: Inhibitory control, often conceptualized as an executive function, is the ability to inhibit or hold back a prepotent response. It is theorized that impulsive behavior reflects a deficit in this ability to inhibit a response; impulsive people may find it more difficult to inhibit action whereas non-impulsive people may find it easier to do so. There is evidence that, in normal adults, commonly used behavioral measures of inhibitory control correlate with standard self-report measures of impulsivity.


title: Impulsivity

text: Inhibitory control may itself be multifaceted, evidenced by numerous distinct inhibition constructs that can be measured in different ways, and relate to specific types of psychopathology. Joel Nigg developed a useful working taxonomy of these different types of inhibition, drawing heavily from the fields of cognitive and personality psychology Nigg's eight proposed types of inhibition include the following:


title: Impulsivity

text: Suppression of a stimulus that elicits an interfering response, enabling a person to complete the primary response. Interference control can also refer to suppressing distractors.


title: Impulsivity

text: Interference control has been measured using cognitive tasks like the stroop test, flanker tasks, dual task interference, and priming tasks. Personality researchers have used the Rothbart effortful control measures and the conscientiousness scale of the Big Five as inventory measures of interference control. Based on imaging and neural research it is theorized that the anterior cingulate, the dorsolateral prefrontal/premotor cortex, and the basal ganglia are related to interference control.


title: Impulsivity

text: Cognitive inhibition is the suppression of unwanted or irrelevant thoughts to protect working memory and attention resources.


title: Impulsivity

text: Cognitive inhibition is most often measured through tests of directed ignoring, self-report on one's intrusive thoughts, and negative priming tasks. As with interference control, personality psychologists have measured cognitive inhibition using the Rothbart Effortful Control scale and the Big Five Conscientiousness scale. The anterior cingulate, the prefrontal regions, and the association cortex seem to be involved in cognitive inhibition.


title: Impulsivity

text: Behavioral inhibition is usually measured using the Go/No Go task, Stop signal task, and reports of suppression of attentional orienting. Surveys that are theoretically relevant to behavioral inhibition include the Rothbart effortful control scale, and the Big Five Conscientiousness dimension. The rationale behind the use of behavioral measures like the Stop signal task is that "go" processes and "stop processes" are independent, and that, upon "go" and "stop" cues, they "race" against each other; if the go process wins the race, the prepotent response is executed, whereas if the stop processes wins the race, the response is withheld. In this context, impulsivity is conceptualized as a relatively slow stop process. The brain regions involved in behavioral inhibition appear to be the lateral and orbital prefrontal regions along with premotor processes.


title: Impulsivity

text: Oculomotor inhibition is tested using antisaccade and oculomotor tasks. Also, the Rothbart effortful control measure and the Big Five Conscientiousness dimension are thought to tap some of the effortful processes underlying the ability to suppress saccade. The frontal eye fields and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex are involved in oculomotor inhibition.


title: Impulsivity

text: Motivational inhibition and response in the face of punishment can be measured using tasks tapping inhibition of primary response, modified go/no go tasks, inhibition of competing response, and emotional Stroop tasks. Personality psychologists also use the Gray behavioral inhibition system measure, the Eysenck scale for neurotic introversion, and the Zuckerman Neuroticism-Anxiety scale. The Septal-hippocampal formation, cingulate, and motor systems seem to be the brain areas most involved in response to punishment.


title: Impulsivity

text: Response to novelty has been measured using the Kagan behavioral inhibition system measure and scales of neurotic introversion. The amygdaloid system is implicated in novelty response.


title: Impulsivity

text: Suppression of recently inspected stimuli for both attention and oculomotor saccade is usually measured using attentional and oculomotor inhibition of return tests. The superior colliculus and the midbrain, oculomotor pathway are involved in suppression of stimuli.


title: Impulsivity

text: Information at locations that are not presently being attended to is suppressed, while attending elsewhere.


title: Impulsivity

text: This involves measures of covert attentional orienting and neglect, along with personality scales on neuroticism. The posterior association cortex and subcortical pathways are implicated in this sort of inhibition.


title: Impulsivity

text: Recent psychology research also yields out the condition of impulsivity in relation to peoples' general goal setting. It is possible these action and inaction goals are underlying people's behavioral differences in their daily lives since they can demonstrate "patterns comparable to natural variation in overall activity levels". More specifically, the level of impulsivity and mania people have might positive correlated with favorable attitudes about and goals of general action while negatively respond to favorable attitudes about and goals of general inaction.


title: Impulsivity

text: The Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS) is one of the oldest and most widely used measures of impulsive personality traits. The first BIS was developed in 1959 by Dr. Ernest Barratt. It has been revised extensively to achieve two major goals: (1) to identify a set of "impulsiveness" items that was orthogonal to a set of "anxiety" items as measured by the Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale (MAS) or the Cattell Anxiety Scale, and (2) to define impulsiveness within the structure of related personality traits like Eysenck's Extraversion dimension or Zuckerman's Sensation-Seeking dimension, especially the disinhibition subfactor. The BIS-11 with 30 items was developed in 1995. According to Patton and colleagues, there are 3 subscales (Attentional Impulsiveness, Motor Impulsiveness, and Non-Planning Impulsiveness) with six factors:


title: Impulsivity

text: The Eysenck Impulsiveness Scale (EIS) is a 54-item yes/no questionnaire designed to measure impulsiveness. Three subscales are computed from this measure: Impulsiveness, Venturesomeness, and Empathy. Impulsiveness is defined as "behaving without thinking and without realizing the risk involved in the behavior". Venturesomeness is conceptualized as "being conscious of the risk of the behavior but acting anyway" The questionnaire was constructed through factor analysis to contain items that most highly loaded on impulsiveness and venturesomeness. The EIS is a widely used and well-validated measure.


title: Impulsivity

text: The Dickman Impulsivity Inventory was first developed in 1990 by Scott J. Dickman. This scale is based on Dickman's proposal that there are two types of impulsivity that are significantly different from one another. This includes functional impulsivity which is characterized by quick decision making when it is optimal, a trait that is often considered to be a source of pride. The scale also includes dysfunctional impulsivity which is characterized by making quick decisions when it is not optimal. This type of impulsivity is most often associated with life difficulties including substance abuse problems and other negative outcomes.


title: Impulsivity

text: This scale includes 63 items of which 23 are related to dysfunctional impulsivity, 17 are related to functional impulsivity, and 23 are filler questions that relate to neither construct. This scale has been developed into a version for use with children as well as into several languages. Dickman showed there is no correlation between these two tendencies across individuals, and they also have different cognitive correlates.


title: Impulsivity

text: The UPPS Impulsive Behavior Scale is a 45-item self-report questionnaire that was designed to measure impulsivity across dimensions of the Five Factor Model of personality. The UPPS includes 4 sub-scales: lack of premeditation, urgency, lack of perseverance, and sensation-seeking.


title: Impulsivity

text: UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale (UPPS-P) is a revised version of the UPPS, including 59 items. It assesses an additional personality pathway to impulsive behavior, Positive Urgency, in addition to the four pathways assessed in the original version of the scale: Urgency (now Negative Urgency), (lack of) Premeditation, (lack of) Perseverance, and Sensation Seeking


title: Impulsivity

text: UPPS-P short version (UPPS-Ps) is 20-item scale that evaluates five different impulsivity facets (4 items per dimension).


title: Impulsivity

text: UPPS-R Interview is a semi-structured interview that measures the degree to which individuals exhibit the various components of impulsivity assessed by the UPPS-P.


title: Impulsivity

text: Lifetime History of Impulsive Behaviors (LHIB) is a 53-item questionnaire designed to assess lifetime history of impulsive behavior (as opposed to impulsive tendencies) as well as the level of distress and impairment associated with these behaviors. The assessment battery was designed to measure the following six dimensions: (a) impulsivity, (b) sensation seeking, (c) trait anxiety, (d) state depression, (e) empathy, and (f) social desirability. The LHIB consists of scales for clinically significant impulsivity, non-clinically significant impulsivity, and impulsivity related distress/impairment.


title: Impulsivity

text: Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System (BIS/BAS) was developed based on the Gray's biopsychological theory of personality which suggests that there are two general motivational systems that underlie behavior and affect: BIS and BAS. This 20-item self-report questionnaire is designed to assess dispositional BIS and BAS sensitivities.


title: Impulsivity

text: Impulsive/Premeditated Aggression Scale (IPAS) is a 30-item self-report questionnaire. Half of the items describe impulsive aggression and half the items describe premeditated aggression. Aggressive behavior has traditionally been classified into two distinct subtypes, impulsive or premeditated. Impulsive aggression is defined as a hair-trigger aggressive response to provocation with loss of behavioral control. Premeditated aggression is defined as a planned or conscious aggressive act, not spontaneous or related to an agitated state. The IPAS is designed to characterize aggressive behavior as predominately impulsive or predominately premeditated in nature. Those subjects who clustered on the impulsive factor showed a broad range of emotional and cognitive impairments; those who clustered on the premeditated factor showed a greater inclination for aggression and anti-social behaviour.


title: Impulsivity

text: The Padua Inventory (PI) consists of 60 items describing common obsessional and compulsive behavior and allows investigation of such problems in normal and clinical subjects.


title: Impulsivity

text: A wide variety of behavioral tests have been devised for the assessment of impulsivity in both clinical and experimental settings. While no single test is a perfect predictor or a sufficient replacement for an actual clinical diagnosis, when used in conjunction with parent/teacher reports, behavioral surveys, and other diagnostic criteria, the utility of behavioral paradigms lies in their ability to narrow in on specific, discrete aspects of the impulsivity umbrella. Quantifying specific deficits is of use to the clinician and the experimenter, both of whom are generally concerned with obtaining objectively measurable treatment effects.


title: Impulsivity

text: One widely recognizable test for impulsivity is the delay of gratification paradigm commonly known as the 'marshmallow test'. Developed in the 1960s to assess 'willpower' and self-control in preschoolers, the marshmallow test consists of placing a single marshmallow in front of a child and informing them that they will be left alone in the room for some duration. The child is told that if the marshmallow remains uneaten when the experimenter returns, they will be awarded a second marshmallow, both of which can then be eaten.


title: Impulsivity

text: Despite its simplicity and ease of administration, evidence from longitudinal studies suggests that the number of seconds preschoolers wait to obtain the second marshmallow is predictive of higher SAT scores, better social and emotional coping in adolescence, higher educational achievement, and less cocaine/crack use.


title: Impulsivity

text: Like the marshmallow test, delay discounting is also a delay of gratification paradigm. It is designed around the principle that the subjective value of a reinforcer decreases, or is 'discounted,' as the delay to reinforcement increases. Subjects are given varying choices between smaller, immediate rewards and larger, delayed rewards. By manipulating reward magnitude and/or reward delay over multiple trials, 'indifference' points can be estimated whereby choosing the small, immediate reward, or the large, delayed reward are about equally likely. Subjects are labeled impulsive when their indifference points decline more steeply as a function of delay compared to the normal population (i.e. greater preference for immediate reward). Unlike the marshmallow test, delay discounting does not require verbal instruction and can be implemented on non-human animals.


title: Impulsivity

text: Two common tests of response inhibition used in humans are the go/no-go task, and a slight variant known as the stop-signal reaction time (SSRT) test. During a go/no-task, the participant is trained over multiple trials to make a particular response (e.g., a key-press) when presented with a 'go' signal. On some trials, a 'stop' signal is presented just prior to, or simultaneously with the 'go' signal, and the subject must inhibit the impending response.


title: Impulsivity

text: The SSRT test is similar, except that the 'stop' signal is presented after the 'go' signal. This small modification increases the difficulty of inhibiting the 'go' response, because the participant has typically already initiated the 'go' response by the time the 'stop' signal is presented. The participant is instructed to respond as fast as possible to the 'go' signal while maintaining the highest possible inhibition accuracy (on no-go trials). During the task, the time at which the 'stop' signal is presented (the stop signal delay or SSD) is dynamically adjusted to match the time after the 'go' signal at which the participant is just able/unable to inhibit their 'go' response. If the participant fails to inhibit their 'go' response, the 'stop' signal is moved slightly closer to the original 'go' signal, and if the participant successfully inhibits their 'go' response, the 'stop' signal is moved slightly ahead in time. The SSRT is thus measured as the average 'go' response time minus the average 'stop' signal presentation time (SSD).


title: Impulsivity

text: The balloon analogue risk task (BART) was designed to assess risk-taking behavior. Subjects are presented with a computer depiction of a balloon that can be incrementally inflated by pressing a response key. As the balloon inflates, the subject accumulates rewards with each new key-press. The balloon is programmed with a constant probability of popping. If the balloon pops, all rewards for that balloon are lost, or the subject may choose to stop inflating and 'bank' the reward for that balloon at any time. Therefore, more key-presses equate to greater reward, but also greater probability of popping and cancelling rewards for that trial. The BART assumes that those with an affinity for 'risk-taking' are more likely to pop the balloon, earning less reward overall than the typical population.


title: Impulsivity

text: The Iowa gambling task (IGT) is a test originally meant to measure decision making specifically within individuals who have ventromedial prefrontal cortex damage. The concept of impulsivity as relates to the IGT is one in which impulsive decisions are a function of an individual's lack of ability to make rational decisions over time due to an over amplification of emotional/somatic reward. In the IGT individuals are provided four decks of cards to choose from. Two of these decks provide much higher rewards but the deductions are also much higher while the second two decks have lower rewards per card but also much lower deductions. Over time anyone who chooses predominantly from the high rewards decks will lose money while those who choose from the smaller rewards decks will gain money.