Delay and probability discounting among payday and title loan recipients

• Receiving payday and automobile title loans is associated with impulsivity.
• Loan borrowers struggle with delaying gratification (i.e., steep delay discounters).
• Loan borrowers, however, do not devalue probabilistic rewards.
• Loan borrowers are more likely to be substance abusers than non-borrowers.
• Substance use mediates the relationship between discounting and loan borrowing.

Payday and title loans are short-term loans associated with significant economic impact. Behavioral theories of impulsive choice may provide insight into behavioral processes that underlie the propensity to take out payday and title loans. Adults between the ages of 18 and 30 recruited from the community completed delay and probability discounting tasks for hypothetical money as well as measures of substance use. Patterns of discounting were characterized using a hyperbolic decay model and area under the curve. Participants who took out a payday and/or title loan in the past (n = 41) exhibited more impulsive choice patterns on the delay discounting task than did those who did not (n = 255). Substance use mediated this relationship between payday and title loan retention and delay discounting. These findings suggest potentially important relationships between payday/title loan borrowing, substance use, and delay discounting.