The association between internalizing problems and impulsivity has been infrequently examined. However, early behavioral inhibition (reactive overcontrol) tends to predict the development of internalizing problems (e.g., Biederman et al., 1990). In addition, teacher-reported ego overcontrol versus undercontrol has been associated with teachers’ (but not parents’ and children’s) reports of children’s internalizing problems (Huey & Weisz, 1997), whereas teacher-rated impulsivity was negatively related to pure internalizing problems in a sample of young school children in China (Eisenberg et al., 2007). However, some investigators have not found an association between tasks that would be expected to tap impulsivity and children’s internalizing problems (Krueger et al., 1996; O’Brien & Frick, 1996) or have found a positive relation between impulsivity and depression when contaminated (i.e., overlapping) items were removed from the scales (Lengua et al., 1998). Martel et al. (2007) reported that observers’ ratings of reactive control (overcontrol vs. undercontrol) were negatively related to adults’ reports of adolescents’ internalizing problems, perhaps because many children with internalizing problems also have externalizing problems (and externalizing is related to high impulsivity).
