Validation of the English Social Attunement Questionnaire (SAQ): associations with substance use, impulsivity and sensation seeking across the lifespan

Our social environment strongly influences behaviors like substance use and sensation seeking. While most research focuses on group pressure and conformity, the role of social attunement-the tendency to align with one's social environment for social reward without explicit pressure-has been largely overlooked. This study evaluated the English version of the Social Attunement Questionnaire (SAQ) and examined its links to age, alcohol and cannabis use, impulsivity, and sensation seeking (N = 447; 54.5% female). Confirmatory factor analysis showed acceptable to good fit of the originally proposed two factor structure, with the one factor solution showing a substantially worse fit. Internal consistency was good across the full scale (α = .82), and acceptable for the cognition subscale (α = .75), and behavior subscale (α = .78). The SAQ also showed similar scale and subscale scores and measurement invariance across sex. Higher social attunement was observed in younger individuals. SAQ scores-particularly the behavior subscale-were positively associated with alcohol and cannabis use, and with impulsivity. Age moderated these associations: among younger individuals, higher social attunement was linked to greater alcohol use and sensation seeking, while these associations reversed with age. These findings suggest that social attunement may act as both a risk and protective factor for risk-taking behaviors, depending on developmental stage. The English SAQ demonstrated solid psychometric properties across its two subscales - Cognition and Behavior - while also proving suitable for use as a single composite scale, supporting its flexibility as a reliable measure of social attunement.