13 ms·

ADHD researcher here, this was already known. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder, the key is that developmental disorders occur over the time-course of typic

ADHD researcher here, this was already known. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder, the key is that developmental disorders occur over the time-course of typical development. To have a diagnosis of ADHD, there must have been symptoms before the age of 7, and furthermore, it's much more likely to occur in younger children because their executive functions are less well developed. On the neurological level, there are different dopaminergic systems developing throughout childhood, such as the motor cortex, the prefrontal cortex, and the dopamine-based reward system. If the motor cortex develops too quickly before the PFC, which controls/regulates behavior, well you'll have hyperactivity that's unregulated. With less developed EF's comes getting out of the chair, losing things, daydreaming, hyperactivity, and all of the diagnosable symptoms of ADHD. Naturally, those who are 6-9 months younger (which might be a 10% age difference in kindergarten) are going to be in very different developmental stages. Requiring younger children to sit still and pay attention may be a much more challenging task since their brains are actually less developed. Thus, they more easily get pushed over the diagnosis line compared to their older classmates. There is another wrinkle here beyond age, which is gender: boys are around 2.5-3X as likely to be diagnosed because they are more hyperactive naturally, i.e. their neurological systems develop at different rates than girls. This sort of behavior in the classroom is much more disruptive than what girls exhibit. Girls tend to be diagnosed with primarily inattentive subtype, since their motor cortex is not usually as over-active, but they still may suffer underdevelopment of the EF that helps them to focus. A girl daydreaming is much less disruptive than a boy standing on his chair, rolling on the floor, or wandering the classroom (all of which happened multiple times in my own classroom).

hour_glass 8y ago
> ADHD researcher here > (all of which happened multiple times in my own classroom) are you a scientist or a school teacher?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- simongr3dal 8y ago
  I imagine it is a very natural part of ADHD research to work with children, either as a counselor, teacher, or a supporting teacher.
  - scrooched_moose 8y ago
    It may not be the case here, but Laboratory Schools are pretty common in early childhood development programs. Basically normal elementary classrooms located on college campuses for researchers to observe. >A laboratory school or demonstration school is an elementary or secondary school operated in association with a university, college, or other teacher education institution and used for the training of future teachers, educational experimentation, educational research, and professional development....Some lab schools are only for preschool or kindergarten children, some are preschool through fifth or sixth grade, and some continue through high school...Laboratory school classrooms may be observed by university professors to assess the student-teacher, but it is desired that the observation be done without the students or student-teachers aware of the observation, thereby avoiding creating a distraction or disruption of classroom activities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_school https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_school
- outworlder 8y ago
  University researcher would be my guess. These are pretty common, you know.
  - hour_glass 8y ago
    yeah but were not talking about university students
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- dang 8y ago
  Hostile gotcha comments, which this reads like to me, are not ok on HN. Please don't post like this. When a user contributes an informative comment in his or her field of expertise, the last thing we need is other users showing up to disincentivize them from ever doing that again. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - IBM 8y ago
    Hi dang. Can you tell me why all my comments are automatically dead? I've sent a bunch of emails to hn@ycombinator.com asking about this but haven't gotten a reply to any of them.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
snthpy 8y ago
Thank you for your informative comment. I was as sceptical of ADHD as most of the commenters here and have been resisting sending my son for an assessment for about a year because I guess what the diagnosis will be. However the more I've been looking into it and observing him, the more I'm coming to the conclusion that it seems to be something physical that he can't control. Just this evening we were in a restaurant and he was standing in his chair, climbing up a pole. etc... When he eventually knocked something over and I sternly reminded him to sit down, he started hitting himself on the head, apparently rueful that he's disappointed me again. It seems to be something he can't control and his repeated failures to do so seem to be affecting his self-esteem. What would you recommend as the best interventions to explore? I would prefer something behavioural but am opening up to considering medication if the will make him feel better about himself and facilitate smoother interactions with his peers.
- openasocket 8y ago
  Not OP, but I strongly suggest getting a full neuropsychological evaluation to diagnose your child. This could ADHD, it could be some other disorder, or it could be nothing at all, and a standardized professional evaluation is the best way to tell. They will also be able to suggest the best path forward for treatment. I can speak from experience, because when I was having trouble in elementary school my parents had be evaluated, which was how I was diagnosed with ADHD. I received behavioral therapy and medication and it really improved my functioning and my quality of life.
- tcoff91 8y ago
  Does your child have enough outlets to burn off his excess energy? It seems to me that kids really evolved to be outside running around with friends and siblings extensively. I would bet if he was getting his heart rate up for 3-5 hrs a day he would be way way calmer the rest of the time. It seems to me that the real problem is that we have constructed a world that is fundamentally at odds with our biology and then when people cannot function within it, we diagnose them as having a disorder.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
raverbashing 8y ago
> this was already known. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder You're sounding like: "being a certain age is a disorder". > Requiring younger children to sit still and pay attention may be a much more challenging task since their brains are actually less developed. Thus, they more easily get pushed over the diagnosis line compared to their older classmates. Teachers who can't control kids (and to be honest, school requirements have been getting broader) will want to give them a pill as it's easier. Reminds to be seen what is the effect of such medicines on kids under development.
- genkimind 8y ago
  From what I've read, increased development in the PFC is one of the effects of stimulants. They are prescribed for PFC brain injuries for a reason.
- johnh3o3 8y ago
  > will want to give them a pill as it's easier. Well yea, sometimes pills help people. > Reminds to be seen what is the effect of such medicines on kids under development I mean adderall (amphetamine) is pretty well studied. Yea they have some adverse effects (stunted growth, not good if you have a pre-existing heart condition, etc.) but as with literally every medicine, the decision to take them or not take them requires you to balance the adverse effects (which can be monitored) with the adverse effects of the illness. It frustrates me so much to see people just flippantly ignore the actual underlying problem that the pill is supposed to be treating as though it's "healthier" to not take the pill. Depressed people can kill themselves or if they don't their lives are pretty crappy. ADHD can cause all sorts of real problems. If you think pills are just an "easy way out" then that's really insulting to people who actually benefit from using them and really don't want to have to deal with judgement from other people who clearly have no idea what it means to suffer from a serious mental illness (ADHD can be debilitating). If you do happen to suffer from a serious mental illness and do not take pills, that's great (maybe?) for you, but that doesn't mean that's the "right" way. In fact I had two parents with mental illnesses that took that route and it was really not fun growing up with that, though it was a great lesson in how not to deal with mental illness.
x220 8y ago
>[boys'] neurological systems develop at different rates than girls How has the patriarchy socialized this inequality? /sarcasm
- jonnycomputer 8y ago
  it is quite possible that some differences in neurodevelopment between boys and girls can be accounted for by differences in how others interact with them as boys and girls, e.g. what they are punished or not punished for doing, how much self control or aggression they are expected or permitted to express, and so on. those are hypotheses, of course, but the brain is plastic, and environmental inputs really do matter.
- dang 8y ago
  Please don't take HN threads into flamewar. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
trevyn 8y ago
>To have a diagnosis of ADHD, there must have been symptoms before the age of 7 FWIW, in the DSM-5, that was changed to age 12.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  This study straddles the time when the DSM-5 was published and came into general use, and in any case it didn't follow kids past age 6-8 depending on birth year, so that part of the change in criteria probably isn't relevant to the results.
DannyB2 8y ago
Can this have anything to do with the increasing use of cell phones and tablets by small children? At a relative's house about a week before Thanksgiving, having McDonalds at the table, the children were actively busily engaged with noisy tablet games and videos at the table. Definitely not something that would be allowed at my house.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
dragonwriter 8y ago
It sounds a lot like what you are saying is that the diagnostic criteria for ADHD do not appropriately account for normal differences between children of different ages and sexes, and therefore systematically overdiagnose younger children and boys (or underdiagnose older children and girls, or some combination.) But, while that may be true (it certainly sounds true), I think there is another factor at work explaining the specific result here: If you need a diagnosis by age 7, and school is the first structured environment where symptoms are likely to be noticed, a child born in August will have essentially twice as long to manifest symptoms to qualify for the diagnosis. If you take any condition, the number of people who will demonstrate symptoms over a two year period of observation will be greater than over a one year period, all other things being equal.
wpietri 8y ago
It seems to me that this study proves something I have long suspected: whatever the neurological reality of this disorder in people who actually have it, the diagnosis is often in effect something like "Teacher Inconvenience Syndrome". And the practical upshot is that rather than build an educational system suitable to children, we are willing to drug them for the convenience of the current system.
- rtpg 8y ago
  I was diagnosed ADD in 6th grade, took medication and it greatly helped me, so a bit biased I was told the disorder is not just about not being able to concentrate or sit down. It’s more about lacking executive control that helps you to focus, stay sitting down, or keeping your mouth shut. Makes you more prone to all sorts of behavior that loses you friends and makes life generally miserable. During my diagnosis a lot of discussion happened around non-focus things, and possible alternative solutions (including CBT through a school program, which was pretty good now that I think of it) This was 15-odd years ago. I think that popular culture goes along the axis you say, but the reality is professionals are trying hard at the diagnosis phase I think? But meanwhile this comment means I get the “lol so you can’t concentrate? Not a real illness” BS that plagued people with clinical depression forever if I ever discuss this with certain people. That being said, the school system is uniquely challenging to all children who have executive control difficulties. Almost nobody’s adult life is as complicated as “trying to fill the demands of 10 different teachers in a week + also grow as a human”. But at least for me, discussion during diagnosis went beyond just school, because it does affect all parts of life in nasty ways.
  - saulrh 8y ago
    It doesn't help at all that the common medications are mild, situational nootropics with grossly inflated PR. Usually you say something like "I got a prescription for X and, instead of overdosing and dying, stopped having episodes" and people immediately realize that you're not making things up. Unless the prescription that fixed your brain was Adderall, in which case they just accuse you of being addicted to speed and try to lecture you about drugs. I've started saying that I have a neurological issue that interferes with memory and concentration. Having been diagnosed at age 27 also helps. People react much better when they're not being blind, bigoted asshats.
stupidbird 8y ago
I read that the researchers knew this was already known, but wanted to publish this because they considered their results to be quite pure of any other factors
eloff 8y ago
This is pure speculation, but is it possible that we're less strict nowadays in child-rearing behavior (none of that children are meant to be seen, not heard nonsense.) So perhaps the children don't develop the same degree of control over their behavior because their parents aren't forcing them to behave themselves to the same degree? I remember when I was a kid, we had to learn to be quiet when my dad was home. Making too much noise would inevitably lead to escalating admonitions from my father to be quiet.
- eloff 8y ago
  People voted this down, but it's plausible. The brain is like a muscle in some ways, you work it out and it gets stronger. So I think it's entirely possible that if you work out your pre-frontal cortex by having to control your behavior all the time because your parents are strict - you develop stronger self control. Sample size of 1, but it seems true enough in my case.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
Endy 8y ago
Since you're a researcher in the field, what would you suggest a teacher (specifically an after-school "enrichment" teacher - who cannot give grades and/or homework) do to maintain better classroom control? I'll be honest, I'm getting to a point where if there's a boy in my class, he gets one class session to prove whether he's one of the loony kind or will actually focus - and then almost completely ignore him and his behavior if the former. It's not good for the kids, it's not really a productive thing on my part, but it's been the only thing that works.
- roguecoder 8y ago
  Occupational therapists can be particularly helpful in working out accommodations like bouncing balls for seating, balance boards, fidget devices, etc, that can provide extra stimulation that allows kids with ADHD to focus.
  - Endy 8y ago
    I went through OT for eye-hand coordination for several years. I wish I had the means to provide that level of accommodation or to successfully convince my schools to do so.
redleggedfrog 8y ago
The message is dangerous here. We're telling young people (very young people) "you are not in control of yourself." The message should be, "you need to learn how to control yourself." The fact that this is a modern malady, and mostly occurs in the medication happy United States (where healthcare is a for profit industry), indicates it's a matter of making money and not improving the lives our our youngsters.
- follower 8y ago
  > The message should be, "you need to learn how to control yourself." For someone with ADHD/ADD some combination of therapy, diagnosis & medication may enable them to learn how to manage their interactions with the world better (or "control themselves", if you prefer). In most cases medication isn't a "magic pill" that fixes everything but it may bring a person to a place where they are able to effectively use the same self-management/organizational techniques used by people who do not have ADHD/ADD. You're probably going to have a Bad Time if you try to run a marathon with a broken leg--regardless of how much self-control one has.
itronitron 8y ago
>> To have a diagnosis of ADHD, there must have been symptoms before the age of 7... As every five year old is likely displaying symptoms of ADHD, that is going to lead to a lot of false positives which seems to be the issue that most concerns people.
fatnoah 8y ago
I'd also love to know how children were diagnosed. My 10 year old was diagnosed with ADHD, but that was the result of a fairly comprehensive two day evaluation by a neuropsychologist. In that case, she was able to provide evidence and reasoning that went well beyond the "can't sit still in class" or "needs constant reminders" notes we'd get from frustrated teachers. Ironically, it was that diagnosis and subsequent lack of support from his school that led us to pull him from private school and put him in public school.
Joof 8y ago
You should do an AMA. I'd love to know about adult ADHD.

hour_glass 8y ago

> ADHD researcher here > (all of which happened multiple times in my own classroom) are you a scientist or a school teacher?

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
simongr3dal 8y ago
I imagine it is a very natural part of ADHD research to work with children, either as a counselor, teacher, or a supporting teacher.
- scrooched_moose 8y ago
  It may not be the case here, but Laboratory Schools are pretty common in early childhood development programs. Basically normal elementary classrooms located on college campuses for researchers to observe. >A laboratory school or demonstration school is an elementary or secondary school operated in association with a university, college, or other teacher education institution and used for the training of future teachers, educational experimentation, educational research, and professional development....Some lab schools are only for preschool or kindergarten children, some are preschool through fifth or sixth grade, and some continue through high school...Laboratory school classrooms may be observed by university professors to assess the student-teacher, but it is desired that the observation be done without the students or student-teachers aware of the observation, thereby avoiding creating a distraction or disruption of classroom activities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_school https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_school
outworlder 8y ago
University researcher would be my guess. These are pretty common, you know.
- hour_glass 8y ago
  yeah but were not talking about university students
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dang 8y ago
Hostile gotcha comments, which this reads like to me, are not ok on HN. Please don't post like this. When a user contributes an informative comment in his or her field of expertise, the last thing we need is other users showing up to disincentivize them from ever doing that again. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- IBM 8y ago
  Hi dang. Can you tell me why all my comments are automatically dead? I've sent a bunch of emails to hn@ycombinator.com asking about this but haven't gotten a reply to any of them.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

snthpy 8y ago

Thank you for your informative comment. I was as sceptical of ADHD as most of the commenters here and have been resisting sending my son for an assessment for about a year because I guess what the diagnosis will be. However the more I've been looking into it and observing him, the more I'm coming to the conclusion that it seems to be something physical that he can't control. Just this evening we were in a restaurant and he was standing in his chair, climbing up a pole. etc... When he eventually knocked something over and I sternly reminded him to sit down, he started hitting himself on the head, apparently rueful that he's disappointed me again. It seems to be something he can't control and his repeated failures to do so seem to be affecting his self-esteem. What would you recommend as the best interventions to explore? I would prefer something behavioural but am opening up to considering medication if the will make him feel better about himself and facilitate smoother interactions with his peers.

openasocket 8y ago
Not OP, but I strongly suggest getting a full neuropsychological evaluation to diagnose your child. This could ADHD, it could be some other disorder, or it could be nothing at all, and a standardized professional evaluation is the best way to tell. They will also be able to suggest the best path forward for treatment. I can speak from experience, because when I was having trouble in elementary school my parents had be evaluated, which was how I was diagnosed with ADHD. I received behavioral therapy and medication and it really improved my functioning and my quality of life.
tcoff91 8y ago
Does your child have enough outlets to burn off his excess energy? It seems to me that kids really evolved to be outside running around with friends and siblings extensively. I would bet if he was getting his heart rate up for 3-5 hrs a day he would be way way calmer the rest of the time. It seems to me that the real problem is that we have constructed a world that is fundamentally at odds with our biology and then when people cannot function within it, we diagnose them as having a disorder.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

raverbashing 8y ago

> this was already known. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder You're sounding like: "being a certain age is a disorder". > Requiring younger children to sit still and pay attention may be a much more challenging task since their brains are actually less developed. Thus, they more easily get pushed over the diagnosis line compared to their older classmates. Teachers who can't control kids (and to be honest, school requirements have been getting broader) will want to give them a pill as it's easier. Reminds to be seen what is the effect of such medicines on kids under development.

genkimind 8y ago
From what I've read, increased development in the PFC is one of the effects of stimulants. They are prescribed for PFC brain injuries for a reason.
johnh3o3 8y ago
> will want to give them a pill as it's easier. Well yea, sometimes pills help people. > Reminds to be seen what is the effect of such medicines on kids under development I mean adderall (amphetamine) is pretty well studied. Yea they have some adverse effects (stunted growth, not good if you have a pre-existing heart condition, etc.) but as with literally every medicine, the decision to take them or not take them requires you to balance the adverse effects (which can be monitored) with the adverse effects of the illness. It frustrates me so much to see people just flippantly ignore the actual underlying problem that the pill is supposed to be treating as though it's "healthier" to not take the pill. Depressed people can kill themselves or if they don't their lives are pretty crappy. ADHD can cause all sorts of real problems. If you think pills are just an "easy way out" then that's really insulting to people who actually benefit from using them and really don't want to have to deal with judgement from other people who clearly have no idea what it means to suffer from a serious mental illness (ADHD can be debilitating). If you do happen to suffer from a serious mental illness and do not take pills, that's great (maybe?) for you, but that doesn't mean that's the "right" way. In fact I had two parents with mental illnesses that took that route and it was really not fun growing up with that, though it was a great lesson in how not to deal with mental illness.

x220 8y ago

>[boys'] neurological systems develop at different rates than girls How has the patriarchy socialized this inequality? /sarcasm

jonnycomputer 8y ago
it is quite possible that some differences in neurodevelopment between boys and girls can be accounted for by differences in how others interact with them as boys and girls, e.g. what they are punished or not punished for doing, how much self control or aggression they are expected or permitted to express, and so on. those are hypotheses, of course, but the brain is plastic, and environmental inputs really do matter.
dang 8y ago
Please don't take HN threads into flamewar. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

trevyn 8y ago

>To have a diagnosis of ADHD, there must have been symptoms before the age of 7 FWIW, in the DSM-5, that was changed to age 12.

dragonwriter 8y ago
This study straddles the time when the DSM-5 was published and came into general use, and in any case it didn't follow kids past age 6-8 depending on birth year, so that part of the change in criteria probably isn't relevant to the results.

DannyB2 8y ago

Can this have anything to do with the increasing use of cell phones and tablets by small children? At a relative's house about a week before Thanksgiving, having McDonalds at the table, the children were actively busily engaged with noisy tablet games and videos at the table. Definitely not something that would be allowed at my house.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

dragonwriter 8y ago

It sounds a lot like what you are saying is that the diagnostic criteria for ADHD do not appropriately account for normal differences between children of different ages and sexes, and therefore systematically overdiagnose younger children and boys (or underdiagnose older children and girls, or some combination.) But, while that may be true (it certainly sounds true), I think there is another factor at work explaining the specific result here: If you need a diagnosis by age 7, and school is the first structured environment where symptoms are likely to be noticed, a child born in August will have essentially twice as long to manifest symptoms to qualify for the diagnosis. If you take any condition, the number of people who will demonstrate symptoms over a two year period of observation will be greater than over a one year period, all other things being equal.

wpietri 8y ago

It seems to me that this study proves something I have long suspected: whatever the neurological reality of this disorder in people who actually have it, the diagnosis is often in effect something like "Teacher Inconvenience Syndrome". And the practical upshot is that rather than build an educational system suitable to children, we are willing to drug them for the convenience of the current system.

rtpg 8y ago
I was diagnosed ADD in 6th grade, took medication and it greatly helped me, so a bit biased I was told the disorder is not just about not being able to concentrate or sit down. It’s more about lacking executive control that helps you to focus, stay sitting down, or keeping your mouth shut. Makes you more prone to all sorts of behavior that loses you friends and makes life generally miserable. During my diagnosis a lot of discussion happened around non-focus things, and possible alternative solutions (including CBT through a school program, which was pretty good now that I think of it) This was 15-odd years ago. I think that popular culture goes along the axis you say, but the reality is professionals are trying hard at the diagnosis phase I think? But meanwhile this comment means I get the “lol so you can’t concentrate? Not a real illness” BS that plagued people with clinical depression forever if I ever discuss this with certain people. That being said, the school system is uniquely challenging to all children who have executive control difficulties. Almost nobody’s adult life is as complicated as “trying to fill the demands of 10 different teachers in a week + also grow as a human”. But at least for me, discussion during diagnosis went beyond just school, because it does affect all parts of life in nasty ways.
- saulrh 8y ago
  It doesn't help at all that the common medications are mild, situational nootropics with grossly inflated PR. Usually you say something like "I got a prescription for X and, instead of overdosing and dying, stopped having episodes" and people immediately realize that you're not making things up. Unless the prescription that fixed your brain was Adderall, in which case they just accuse you of being addicted to speed and try to lecture you about drugs. I've started saying that I have a neurological issue that interferes with memory and concentration. Having been diagnosed at age 27 also helps. People react much better when they're not being blind, bigoted asshats.

stupidbird 8y ago

I read that the researchers knew this was already known, but wanted to publish this because they considered their results to be quite pure of any other factors

eloff 8y ago

This is pure speculation, but is it possible that we're less strict nowadays in child-rearing behavior (none of that children are meant to be seen, not heard nonsense.) So perhaps the children don't develop the same degree of control over their behavior because their parents aren't forcing them to behave themselves to the same degree? I remember when I was a kid, we had to learn to be quiet when my dad was home. Making too much noise would inevitably lead to escalating admonitions from my father to be quiet.

eloff 8y ago
People voted this down, but it's plausible. The brain is like a muscle in some ways, you work it out and it gets stronger. So I think it's entirely possible that if you work out your pre-frontal cortex by having to control your behavior all the time because your parents are strict - you develop stronger self control. Sample size of 1, but it seems true enough in my case.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

Endy 8y ago

Since you're a researcher in the field, what would you suggest a teacher (specifically an after-school "enrichment" teacher - who cannot give grades and/or homework) do to maintain better classroom control? I'll be honest, I'm getting to a point where if there's a boy in my class, he gets one class session to prove whether he's one of the loony kind or will actually focus - and then almost completely ignore him and his behavior if the former. It's not good for the kids, it's not really a productive thing on my part, but it's been the only thing that works.

roguecoder 8y ago
Occupational therapists can be particularly helpful in working out accommodations like bouncing balls for seating, balance boards, fidget devices, etc, that can provide extra stimulation that allows kids with ADHD to focus.
- Endy 8y ago
  I went through OT for eye-hand coordination for several years. I wish I had the means to provide that level of accommodation or to successfully convince my schools to do so.

redleggedfrog 8y ago

The message is dangerous here. We're telling young people (very young people) "you are not in control of yourself." The message should be, "you need to learn how to control yourself." The fact that this is a modern malady, and mostly occurs in the medication happy United States (where healthcare is a for profit industry), indicates it's a matter of making money and not improving the lives our our youngsters.

follower 8y ago
> The message should be, "you need to learn how to control yourself." For someone with ADHD/ADD some combination of therapy, diagnosis & medication may enable them to learn how to manage their interactions with the world better (or "control themselves", if you prefer). In most cases medication isn't a "magic pill" that fixes everything but it may bring a person to a place where they are able to effectively use the same self-management/organizational techniques used by people who do not have ADHD/ADD. You're probably going to have a Bad Time if you try to run a marathon with a broken leg--regardless of how much self-control one has.

itronitron 8y ago

>> To have a diagnosis of ADHD, there must have been symptoms before the age of 7... As every five year old is likely displaying symptoms of ADHD, that is going to lead to a lot of false positives which seems to be the issue that most concerns people.

fatnoah 8y ago

I'd also love to know how children were diagnosed. My 10 year old was diagnosed with ADHD, but that was the result of a fairly comprehensive two day evaluation by a neuropsychologist. In that case, she was able to provide evidence and reasoning that went well beyond the "can't sit still in class" or "needs constant reminders" notes we'd get from frustrated teachers. Ironically, it was that diagnosis and subsequent lack of support from his school that led us to pull him from private school and put him in public school.

Joof 8y ago

You should do an AMA. I'd love to know about adult ADHD.