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Tik Tok is the reason I've been told several times I have ADHD. Pretty sure I don't! This phenomenon is so infuriating. The only half-convincing defense I've he

Tik Tok is the reason I've been told several times I have ADHD. Pretty sure I don't! This phenomenon is so infuriating. The only half-convincing defense I've heard of it is that it could, maybe, theoretically, disseminate information about illnesses to people who don't have the money to see a professional, but the other effects are so much worse it doesn't seem worth it.

jrm4 4y ago
Tiktok and pop-culture generally make me very skeptical on "ADHD", the so-called "spectrum" and "neurodivergence" generally. I'm not saying these things don't exist, but much of it seems very difficult to falsify -- which needs to be the gold standard of determining these sort of things; e.g. "By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent?"
- kzrdude 4y ago
  Part of this is just giving labels to what happens when we are glued to screens and addictive apps and internet media, isn't it? It strikes me as something that is partly happening to me too, I can't really put down the addictive medias available. Of course things in professional or personal life may suffer when you have an addiction. Of course medication could help one control it, etc.
  - juve1996 4y ago
    Not really since ADHD has been around for much longer than addictive apps and the internet media.
  - duncan-donuts 4y ago
    To a certain extent maybe. I have adhd. Was diagnosed as an adult by several professionals. Not self diagnosed. There’s a difference between “this media is addicting and I can’t stop” and “I went into hyper focus for 6 hours and I forgot to pick up my kids”. In fairness I also have a hard time with consuming things online, but I also can completely forget the world around me. It’s not just a time management deficit. I have no concept of time-passed in that state.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- kortex 4y ago
  > much of it seems very difficult to falsify It's quite straightforward, albeit involved (as in technically easy, but takes time) to falsify. You have to work with a licensed medical professional who will evaluate traits, strengths, and difficulties, and to what extent they impact functioning as a person in society. Basically, are they "well-adjusted"? If they make it through school, college and adulthood without a ton of struggling, therapy, possibly meds, you can almost certainly rule out neurodivergence (at the very least, it won't be clinically significant )
  - jnovek 4y ago
    > Basically, are they "well-adjusted"? This is a radically behaviorist interpretation. A common criticism of the diagnostics for ADHD (and Autism, for that matter) is that it ignores the person’s internal experience. I was formally diagnosed with ADHD in 2017. I’d been visibly quite successful in that time, but at the expense of my own mental health because I was fighting a constant uphill battle. ADHD was a set of shackles I didn’t even know I had.
    - Ensorceled 4y ago
      Agreed. I was finally diagnosed with ADHD a few years ago. I had been self mediating with coffee and adrenaline for several decades. But I was, by all accounts, successful. Just not happy or healthy or as successful as I could have been.
      - kortex 4y ago
        > Just not happy or healthy or as successful as I could have been. That is precisely what I mean. You were not naturally "well-adjusted", you just learned to adjust and adapt over time. It wasn't the best choice of words but I can't edit.
        Ensorceled 4y ago
        There are clinicians who believe that if you are not "below average" or "experiencing extreme distress" then, by definition, you don't have a disorder. Because I have a well paying job, some clinicians would not categorize me has having ADHD because I'm operating at an "above average" capacity. We're just reacting to what appears to be agreement with that approach, even if unintentional.
- DoughnutHole 4y ago
  Well the problem with ADHD is the same problem of pretty much all psychological disorders - diagnosis is only ever really fuzzily falsifiable. You get diagnosed with it if you tick enough of the boxes of behaviours/dysfunctions associated with it - you can fall short of a diagnosis by one behaviour and still be in a very similar condition to a diagnosed person, or tick enough boxes but fall short based on the diagnosing physicians judgement of severity. The interesting thing is that despite the condition being composed of a wide gamut of seemingly unrelated behaviour, ~90% of people with ADHD respond extremely well to the same treatment - stimulant medication. We also observed notable neurological similarities in aggregate among people with the condition, but not enough to have much utility as a diagnostic tool.
  - giraffe_lady 4y ago
    I can credibly claim stimulant treatment for adhd saved my life so I'm not at all skeptical of its value in this context. But doesn't everyone respond extremely well to stimulants? They're some of the most common recreational drugs and neurotypical people seek them out for performance enhancement on cognitive tasks.
    - LocalPCGuy 4y ago
      > doesn't everyone respond extremely well to stimulants? Not really - despite their popularity (as you say, heavily sought after), studies have shown that there really isn't a significant cognitive boost for neurotypical folks that take these stimulants[1]. While they have a significant effect for those with ADHD because their brain is not providing the chemicals properly, and these drugs enable that. They aren't boosting cognitive abilities for those with ADHD, they are fixing a problem so that folks with ADHD can think and focus properly. Didn't spend a ton of time looking up the sources I've read this in, but here is one: [1] - https://www.mdpi.com/2226-4787/6/3/58 https://www.mdpi.com/2226-4787/6/3/58 > Studies support that stimulants enhance attention, memory, self-regulation and executive function in individuals with ADHD. Recent research, however, has found that many college students without ADHD report misusing prescription stimulants, primarily to enhance their cognitive abilities. > ... > Overall, the present findings indicate dissociation between the effects of Adderall on activation and neurocognition, and more importantly, contrary to common belief, Adderall had little impact on neurocognitive performance in healthy college students.
- robmccoll 4y ago
  As an outsider, it seems like medical science would be particularly challenging. Underlying mechanisms for many common conditions aren't known or fully understood, but the collection of symptoms (syndrome) need to be treated now to improve quality of life. It would seem like this would lead to less strict and rigid systems of analysis and methodology out of necessity (working with the best information and analysis at hand, knowing that there are still many unknowns). tl;dr - everyone's probably just doing the best they can.
- JulianChastain 4y ago
  There are standard diagnostic tests to falsify whether you have ADHD, that give a binary result as to whether the patient has ADHD/ADD. It is very easy to take one of these tests and determine whether you experience the symptoms
  - tough 4y ago
    Any free online? Or need to go to a doc
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - sct202 4y ago
    There were rampant rumors in my HS and college of people memorizing a list of answers to get Adderall to help them study better, and this was 10+ years ago.
- marginalia_nu 4y ago
  It's probably difficult to demand objectivity in a field where the topic is often by its very definition subjective. Many mental illnesses are defined by how they subjectively affect us, of how we experience the world. You simply can't measure what it's like to be me. You can't conclusively prove or disprove that I have ADHD. I may describe my experiences in a way that aligns with such a diagnosis, but for all you can tell I may be a P-zombie merely acting as though I experience things. For what you're able to measure, I may not even have an experience.
- washbrain 4y ago
  What's with the scare quotes and the use of "so called"? You can ask your question without them and it will feel a whole lot less patronizing.
  - jrm4 4y ago
    I'm skeptical of all of them in their current form. It helps bolster my argument. I acknowledge that I might be wrong, and if it inspires someone to call me out in an effective way, great! Now, ask yourself -- in a forum that's supposed to be about discussion and answering questions, why do you think it's very important to police how I use punctuation?
    - washbrain 4y ago
      It's not policing, I'm suggesting that in a dialogue the use of scare quotes signals a negative interest in actually engaging in discussion. Typically, scare quotes will be interpreted as someone who has already made their mind up and won't be moved. Compare: "I'm skeptical about the prevalence of autism in teens." "I'm skeptical about the prevalence of "autism" in teens." The first absolutely conveys your skepticism, but doesn't come with an implied sneer. I don't know, maybe this feedback isn't useful or you reject it, that's fine too. I just figured you may want to know that the way folks might interpret the quotes might be heavier than you intended.
      - aliqot 4y ago
        I don't think that's what they meant.
        washbrain 4y ago
        Thanks for the feedback!
        washbrain 4y ago
        Edit: The parent poster changed their comment entirely after I replied but nonetheless, feedback received.
- baryphonic 4y ago
  ADHD person here. When I was diagnosed in high school, I honestly didn't believe it, but I have come to accept that it really is a difference between myself and normal people. Normal, small, repetitive tasks are extremely hard to remember and keep track of. I need to write tasks down or perform them immediately, or I will commit and forget. However, when a novel and interesting task comes along, I can get lost in it for hours, forgetting to eat or sleep or even spend time with my family. "Interesting" is subjective, but I'm sure you could design a study that could begin to identify people. One problem is that there's a pop culture understanding of ADHD and there's the medical version. Because ADHD is poorly understood and is diagnosed by ticking boxes, I get the feeling that some people just say what they need to say to get the diagnosis/meds/whatever. (I am unmedicated and have been my entire adult life. I felt a bit like a zombie on Adderall, and my heart was constantly racing.) On the other hand, I do think there's probably a better, deeper explanation that has eluded the professionals. I suspect that ADHD has something to do with a lack of free play for young children. When kids are able to free play, they invent their own games and set their own boundaries and learn to regulate themselves; this does not happen when they are under adults' direction. As a consequence, we see that the US has extremely high ADHD rates in children, whereas in other countries, especially ones where early education consists almost entirely of free play, especially outdoors, is encouraged, the rates are quite low.[0] Further, within the US, we see that children born in August seem to have a higher chance of an ADHD diagnosis than those born in September.[1] I suspect that the disorder is "real," but with a very strong "nurture" component. In the US over the past 60 years or so, children's lives have become increasingly directed by adults, from time spent in school to time spent in sports or clubs organized by adults to time spent at home doing homework. At the same time, Americans have become increasingly hostile to the idea of children's free play. "Where is that kid's adult?" is something I hear from other parents when I take my kids to the playground. If I could summarize my own experience, I would say I have trouble self-regulating along the spectrum of being bored or interested in a topic. If I'm bored, or think I will be, I have almost an anxious response; if I'm interested, I may get lost in the task or topic till a phone call from my wife breaks me out of it. For what it's worth, when I'm healthy, I can rarely sleep more than 6 1/2 hours per night. [0]https://academic.oup.com/shm/article/30/4/767/2919401 https://academic.oup.com/shm/article/30/4/767/2919401 [1]https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/could-being-born-in-august-make-an-adhd-diagnosis-more-likely https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/could-being-born-in-augu...
- DharmaPolice 4y ago
  People having these issues is real, it's the severity that's the question. I don't think it's a matter of someone being neurodivergent or not - it's that there is likely a bell curve type distribution on a lot of psychological attributes (how long you can concentrate as an example) and the people at the lowest end of the curve might require some sort of intervention in order to live happy productive lives. There are also going to be a far larger group of people who are merely below average and who find education in particular harder than their peers but who don't qualify for any medical or psychological intervention. I suspect it's this latter group that social media diagnosis appeals to most - if you're not doing as well as you (or your parents) would like then normally you just have to feel stupid/worthless. These (self) diagnosis provide a level of explanation (and therefore comfort). I self-diagnosed myself with mild ADD many years ago and even self-medicated (which in terms of productivity worked well). But meeting people with severe ADHD made me reconsider my alleged issues - sure, I can't concentrate for as long as I'd like but these people couldn't sit still for 15 seconds.
- falcolas 4y ago
  We can't seem to have a discussion about neurological disorders without someone denying the existence - while trying to appear like they are not - of some of the best explored neurological disorders based on some fuzzy skepticism that displays they have read none of the vast swaths of scientific studies that exist on the topic. > By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent? Easy: is the severity of the ADHD and Autistic traits you exhibit low enough that they do not impair your ability to function on a day-to-day basis in society? If not, you don't have ADHD or Autism. What does not impaired look like compared to impaired? - Struggling to focus on something for minutes or hours, vs. being unable to concentrate on a task. - Occasionally struggling with overcoming mental hurdles to perform a task vs frequently being incapable - yes, literally incapable, no matter the reward or punishment - of performing a task. - Focusing on a task you enjoy while still being aware of the state of your body - keeping reasonably hydrated, fed, and use of the facilities - vs. not being aware. - Occasionally forgetting words - like "watch" - or names, vs frequently. - An occasionally compromised working memory (typically with an outside trigger like alcohol or lack of sleep), compared to a permanently compromised working memory. Compromised being able to store 4 items in your short term memory when the average for the populace is 7. - Occasionally forgetting that items and people exist if they are not in your direct sight, versus constantly forgetting, where constantly means remembering is the exception instead of the norm. One final note - ADHD is not some new disorder unique to the TikTok generation. ADHD has been formally recognized and studied as far back as 1902 by Sir George Frederick Still.
  - bobkazamakis 4y ago
    >Easy: is the severity of the ADHD and Autistic traits you exhibit low enough that they do not impair your ability to function on a day-to-day basis in society? If not, you don't have ADHD or Autism. Easy: define "function on a day-to-day basis in society"
    - corobo 4y ago
      They kinda went into that in the rest of the comment after what you quoted but if you need more there's a couple books that contain this information too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivity_disorder#Subtypes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivit...
- anotherman554 4y ago
  Medical diagnosis are man made labels created by committee. If I say having blond hair is a medical condition then I can absolutely do a falsifiable test of whether you have blond hair. So the issue isn't so much falsifiability per see but instead the whether you trust the judgement of people who decide what is "normal" or "not normal".
  - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
    Diagnoses are defined through research. The committee part is just about updating diagnostic manuals to reflect current consensus. New diagnoses need to be proven to be distinct entities(i.e not redundant) and clinically meaningful. And they specifically need to have a diagnostic test. Having blond hair has a diagnostic test, sure, but that diagnostic test does not in itself constitute a distinct, clinically useful diagnosis. Of course hair colour can change due to medical conditions, but then the hair colour would obviously be just one symptom of some set of conditions that may have caused it.
    - anotherman554 4y ago
      I do not agree. You can research how much of the population has blond hair, and how much this diverges from the "typical" hair color. But the decision to define or not define blond hair as a medical condition is a value call because the definition of a medical condition is ultimately that which people call a medical condition. And whether something is clinically useful isn't the standard for defining a condition, because ability to successfully treat a disease isn't a standard in deciding whether something is a disease and because therapy isn't limited to people who have diseases. (Unless professionals are now calling marital problems a disease?)
      - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
        You can agree or disagree, but the fact is that diagnoses almost always include a mandatory requirement that the condition has a significant negative impact on the patient's life. It's not merely a value judgment, and it's definitely not an arbitray judgement. The AMA or the CDC can't just decide that blod hair is now a medical disorder for no other reason than it would be helpful to your strawman. Clearly a lot of research and deliberation goes into these decisions. That's why new revisions of the DSM literally take years to complete.
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  Source: I've been diagnosed with severe ADHD on 4 occasions(mostly retests for due diligence reasons after switching psychiatrist) Generally by having a full workup with a psychiatrist. They will do various interviews. Possibly might have to interview parents and teachers in pediatric cases or in adult cases where ADHD was not diagnosed in childhood(childhood onset is a diagnostic requirement for adult ADHD). In more difficult cases a neuropsychologist might be consulted and can perform various neurological tests to more thoroughly rule out other disorder. There's some promising work on blood biomarkers and brain imaging but nothing in clinical use yet afaik.
  - BeFlatXIII 4y ago
    > childhood onset is a diagnostic requirement for adult ADHD What would be the diagnosis for adult-onset ADHD symptoms without a childhood history of those symptoms?
    - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
      Theoretically, any type to damage to or dysfunction in the frontal lobe which is affected by ADHD can manifest similar symptoms. There are some nutritional deficiencies that can cause a false positive for ADHD(zinc, possibly omega-3). There's also some curious cases of ADHD manifesting due to an very specific type of potassium imbalance. Though AFAIK the only known cases of this have been genetic. It's probably also possible that childhood ADHD could have been "hiding" in childhood, if say your childhood environment was very ADHD-compatible it might not have been enough of a problem to be detected then, but become a problem in adulthood as your environment and responsibilites change. Probably you could make an argument for a diagnosis of adult ADHD in a case like that if there's at least a family history of ADHD.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- faeriechangling 4y ago
  I've spent a long time in disability communities, falsifiability gets very little respect, and "gatekeeping" is generally expressly or implicitly taboo. So with Autism, probably the most common disqualifier in practice is that the disorder requires childhood presentation and a lot of people don't know this. So somebody will come in, say "oh I wasn't autistic at all as a child, but I felt very autistic as a teenager, so I asked a doctor, and he said I wasn't autistic". People will respond with "oh, doctors don't know anything about autism, they underdiagnose minorities and women all the time, that proves it" and "oh, women actually don't present as autistic in childhood, they can just be masking, but that doesn't mean they aren't actually autistic". This happens EVERY time, especially if a woman is involved, and means that you can't falsify the idea that somebody was autistic in childhood. I have been banned once for saying that disabled people should doubt other peoples disabilities (on the grounds of preventing exploitation and misallocation of resources), I got told that I was spreading ableist myths that disabled people are responsible for other disabled people lacking resources, that I was reinforcing the ableist myth that disabled people are just exploiting non-disabled people (of course, disabled people do just as much for the able as the able do for them, and thus there is no advantage to faking disability), that it was inappropriate to talk about doubting disabilities on an autism community, and that they wished I had a number of painful disabilities that I couldn't receive pain medication for because I wasn't believed.
  - watwut 4y ago
    You are treating "not presenting symptoms as kids" and "not being diagnosed as a kid" interchangeably.
    - faeriechangling 4y ago
      I'm not, I'm in no way saying that explicitly or implicitly. I do not even remotely conflate these two things. It is possible to show symptoms as a child, not get diagnosed as a child, and get diagnosed as an adult. I have zero issue with that. Here's the exact phrasing of the criteria https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html >Symptoms must be present in the early developmental period (but may not become fully manifest until social demands exceed limited capacities, or may be masked by learned strategies in later life). There's nothing in the diagnosis that says you need to be diagnosed as a child. I adamantly do not believe that's required for a diagnosis in any way shape or form.
- deleted 4y ago
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- corobo 4y ago
  > "By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent?" Isn't that called differential diagnosis? For me they were essentially post-diagnosing childhood ADHD. Not much of my present existence was relevant other than the effects it had on my life now (whether I need meds or not). Sure I could have lied but it would have been a hell of a lie to build and keep straight across my appointments. I was also asked if I'd heard of ADHD from TikTok.. not sure what the result would have been if I had.
madeofpalk 4y ago
It's not just related to tiktok, but there definitely was a strong fetisisation of ADHD going on which seemed to peak in 2020-2021 (but still there).
- Ensorceled 4y ago
  20 years ago, when my step kids were young, people also said ADHD and Autism was a "fad" and "overdiagnosed". People have been talking like this since at least the 90's and always claiming it's a new, recent, thing.
  - falcolas 4y ago
    Heck, my sister was diagnosed (and I wish I had been diagnosed) in the 80's. Plus, before it got the name ADD (and after, ADHD), it was studied by the names "Hyperactive child syndrome", "Hyperkinetic reaction of childhood", and a few others. This has been recognized and studied for over a century.
  - deleted 4y ago
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falcolas 4y ago
> The only half-convincing defense I've heard of it is that it could, maybe, theoretically, disseminate information about illnesses to people who don't have the money to see a professional Another thing TikTok does is provide a venue for sharing stories - "you're not alone" - and sharing coping mechanisms. Good things.
albrewer 4y ago
On the flip side, I asked my psych to take an ADHD test because I found the stuff at /r/ADHDmemes consistently hit far too close to home to be a coincidence.
- overthemoon 4y ago
  Do you mind if I ask how that went? I've circled these issues before. For me, I suspect the underlying issue is something else, but I'm curious about your experience.
  - albrewer 4y ago
    I just asked to be screened for ADHD. The guy was pretty skeptical, and the test would have been out of pocket with or without insurance. In the actual test, you had to watch a square flash on the screen at random intervals and click a clicker if it flashed on the bottom. That's it. It took an hour. Afterward, you get your results based on mistakes and reaction time over time. The data and statistics associated with it are really interesting, too.
chemmail 4y ago
I've noticed this starting to carry over. I watch some Mr Beast things after listening to an awesome interview with him. But his videos are almost unwatchable. It's like 20 tick toks strung together. They just edit it that way to get the tik tock crowd. Very infuriating. How do you learn or digest good information if you get blasted with 99% shit every 15 seconds?

jrm4 4y ago

Tiktok and pop-culture generally make me very skeptical on "ADHD", the so-called "spectrum" and "neurodivergence" generally. I'm not saying these things don't exist, but much of it seems very difficult to falsify -- which needs to be the gold standard of determining these sort of things; e.g. "By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent?"

kzrdude 4y ago
Part of this is just giving labels to what happens when we are glued to screens and addictive apps and internet media, isn't it? It strikes me as something that is partly happening to me too, I can't really put down the addictive medias available. Of course things in professional or personal life may suffer when you have an addiction. Of course medication could help one control it, etc.
- juve1996 4y ago
  Not really since ADHD has been around for much longer than addictive apps and the internet media.
- duncan-donuts 4y ago
  To a certain extent maybe. I have adhd. Was diagnosed as an adult by several professionals. Not self diagnosed. There’s a difference between “this media is addicting and I can’t stop” and “I went into hyper focus for 6 hours and I forgot to pick up my kids”. In fairness I also have a hard time with consuming things online, but I also can completely forget the world around me. It’s not just a time management deficit. I have no concept of time-passed in that state.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
kortex 4y ago
> much of it seems very difficult to falsify It's quite straightforward, albeit involved (as in technically easy, but takes time) to falsify. You have to work with a licensed medical professional who will evaluate traits, strengths, and difficulties, and to what extent they impact functioning as a person in society. Basically, are they "well-adjusted"? If they make it through school, college and adulthood without a ton of struggling, therapy, possibly meds, you can almost certainly rule out neurodivergence (at the very least, it won't be clinically significant )
- jnovek 4y ago
  > Basically, are they "well-adjusted"? This is a radically behaviorist interpretation. A common criticism of the diagnostics for ADHD (and Autism, for that matter) is that it ignores the person’s internal experience. I was formally diagnosed with ADHD in 2017. I’d been visibly quite successful in that time, but at the expense of my own mental health because I was fighting a constant uphill battle. ADHD was a set of shackles I didn’t even know I had.
  - Ensorceled 4y ago
    Agreed. I was finally diagnosed with ADHD a few years ago. I had been self mediating with coffee and adrenaline for several decades. But I was, by all accounts, successful. Just not happy or healthy or as successful as I could have been.
    - kortex 4y ago
      > Just not happy or healthy or as successful as I could have been. That is precisely what I mean. You were not naturally "well-adjusted", you just learned to adjust and adapt over time. It wasn't the best choice of words but I can't edit.
      - Ensorceled 4y ago
        There are clinicians who believe that if you are not "below average" or "experiencing extreme distress" then, by definition, you don't have a disorder. Because I have a well paying job, some clinicians would not categorize me has having ADHD because I'm operating at an "above average" capacity. We're just reacting to what appears to be agreement with that approach, even if unintentional.
DoughnutHole 4y ago
Well the problem with ADHD is the same problem of pretty much all psychological disorders - diagnosis is only ever really fuzzily falsifiable. You get diagnosed with it if you tick enough of the boxes of behaviours/dysfunctions associated with it - you can fall short of a diagnosis by one behaviour and still be in a very similar condition to a diagnosed person, or tick enough boxes but fall short based on the diagnosing physicians judgement of severity. The interesting thing is that despite the condition being composed of a wide gamut of seemingly unrelated behaviour, ~90% of people with ADHD respond extremely well to the same treatment - stimulant medication. We also observed notable neurological similarities in aggregate among people with the condition, but not enough to have much utility as a diagnostic tool.
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  I can credibly claim stimulant treatment for adhd saved my life so I'm not at all skeptical of its value in this context. But doesn't everyone respond extremely well to stimulants? They're some of the most common recreational drugs and neurotypical people seek them out for performance enhancement on cognitive tasks.
  - LocalPCGuy 4y ago
    > doesn't everyone respond extremely well to stimulants? Not really - despite their popularity (as you say, heavily sought after), studies have shown that there really isn't a significant cognitive boost for neurotypical folks that take these stimulants[1]. While they have a significant effect for those with ADHD because their brain is not providing the chemicals properly, and these drugs enable that. They aren't boosting cognitive abilities for those with ADHD, they are fixing a problem so that folks with ADHD can think and focus properly. Didn't spend a ton of time looking up the sources I've read this in, but here is one: [1] - https://www.mdpi.com/2226-4787/6/3/58 https://www.mdpi.com/2226-4787/6/3/58 > Studies support that stimulants enhance attention, memory, self-regulation and executive function in individuals with ADHD. Recent research, however, has found that many college students without ADHD report misusing prescription stimulants, primarily to enhance their cognitive abilities. > ... > Overall, the present findings indicate dissociation between the effects of Adderall on activation and neurocognition, and more importantly, contrary to common belief, Adderall had little impact on neurocognitive performance in healthy college students.
robmccoll 4y ago
As an outsider, it seems like medical science would be particularly challenging. Underlying mechanisms for many common conditions aren't known or fully understood, but the collection of symptoms (syndrome) need to be treated now to improve quality of life. It would seem like this would lead to less strict and rigid systems of analysis and methodology out of necessity (working with the best information and analysis at hand, knowing that there are still many unknowns). tl;dr - everyone's probably just doing the best they can.
JulianChastain 4y ago
There are standard diagnostic tests to falsify whether you have ADHD, that give a binary result as to whether the patient has ADHD/ADD. It is very easy to take one of these tests and determine whether you experience the symptoms
- tough 4y ago
  Any free online? Or need to go to a doc
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- sct202 4y ago
  There were rampant rumors in my HS and college of people memorizing a list of answers to get Adderall to help them study better, and this was 10+ years ago.
marginalia_nu 4y ago
It's probably difficult to demand objectivity in a field where the topic is often by its very definition subjective. Many mental illnesses are defined by how they subjectively affect us, of how we experience the world. You simply can't measure what it's like to be me. You can't conclusively prove or disprove that I have ADHD. I may describe my experiences in a way that aligns with such a diagnosis, but for all you can tell I may be a P-zombie merely acting as though I experience things. For what you're able to measure, I may not even have an experience.
washbrain 4y ago
What's with the scare quotes and the use of "so called"? You can ask your question without them and it will feel a whole lot less patronizing.
- jrm4 4y ago
  I'm skeptical of all of them in their current form. It helps bolster my argument. I acknowledge that I might be wrong, and if it inspires someone to call me out in an effective way, great! Now, ask yourself -- in a forum that's supposed to be about discussion and answering questions, why do you think it's very important to police how I use punctuation?
  - washbrain 4y ago
    It's not policing, I'm suggesting that in a dialogue the use of scare quotes signals a negative interest in actually engaging in discussion. Typically, scare quotes will be interpreted as someone who has already made their mind up and won't be moved. Compare: "I'm skeptical about the prevalence of autism in teens." "I'm skeptical about the prevalence of "autism" in teens." The first absolutely conveys your skepticism, but doesn't come with an implied sneer. I don't know, maybe this feedback isn't useful or you reject it, that's fine too. I just figured you may want to know that the way folks might interpret the quotes might be heavier than you intended.
    - aliqot 4y ago
      I don't think that's what they meant.
      - washbrain 4y ago
        Thanks for the feedback!
        washbrain 4y ago
        Edit: The parent poster changed their comment entirely after I replied but nonetheless, feedback received.
baryphonic 4y ago
ADHD person here. When I was diagnosed in high school, I honestly didn't believe it, but I have come to accept that it really is a difference between myself and normal people. Normal, small, repetitive tasks are extremely hard to remember and keep track of. I need to write tasks down or perform them immediately, or I will commit and forget. However, when a novel and interesting task comes along, I can get lost in it for hours, forgetting to eat or sleep or even spend time with my family. "Interesting" is subjective, but I'm sure you could design a study that could begin to identify people. One problem is that there's a pop culture understanding of ADHD and there's the medical version. Because ADHD is poorly understood and is diagnosed by ticking boxes, I get the feeling that some people just say what they need to say to get the diagnosis/meds/whatever. (I am unmedicated and have been my entire adult life. I felt a bit like a zombie on Adderall, and my heart was constantly racing.) On the other hand, I do think there's probably a better, deeper explanation that has eluded the professionals. I suspect that ADHD has something to do with a lack of free play for young children. When kids are able to free play, they invent their own games and set their own boundaries and learn to regulate themselves; this does not happen when they are under adults' direction. As a consequence, we see that the US has extremely high ADHD rates in children, whereas in other countries, especially ones where early education consists almost entirely of free play, especially outdoors, is encouraged, the rates are quite low.[0] Further, within the US, we see that children born in August seem to have a higher chance of an ADHD diagnosis than those born in September.[1] I suspect that the disorder is "real," but with a very strong "nurture" component. In the US over the past 60 years or so, children's lives have become increasingly directed by adults, from time spent in school to time spent in sports or clubs organized by adults to time spent at home doing homework. At the same time, Americans have become increasingly hostile to the idea of children's free play. "Where is that kid's adult?" is something I hear from other parents when I take my kids to the playground. If I could summarize my own experience, I would say I have trouble self-regulating along the spectrum of being bored or interested in a topic. If I'm bored, or think I will be, I have almost an anxious response; if I'm interested, I may get lost in the task or topic till a phone call from my wife breaks me out of it. For what it's worth, when I'm healthy, I can rarely sleep more than 6 1/2 hours per night. [0]https://academic.oup.com/shm/article/30/4/767/2919401 https://academic.oup.com/shm/article/30/4/767/2919401 [1]https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/could-being-born-in-august-make-an-adhd-diagnosis-more-likely https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/could-being-born-in-augu...
DharmaPolice 4y ago
People having these issues is real, it's the severity that's the question. I don't think it's a matter of someone being neurodivergent or not - it's that there is likely a bell curve type distribution on a lot of psychological attributes (how long you can concentrate as an example) and the people at the lowest end of the curve might require some sort of intervention in order to live happy productive lives. There are also going to be a far larger group of people who are merely below average and who find education in particular harder than their peers but who don't qualify for any medical or psychological intervention. I suspect it's this latter group that social media diagnosis appeals to most - if you're not doing as well as you (or your parents) would like then normally you just have to feel stupid/worthless. These (self) diagnosis provide a level of explanation (and therefore comfort). I self-diagnosed myself with mild ADD many years ago and even self-medicated (which in terms of productivity worked well). But meeting people with severe ADHD made me reconsider my alleged issues - sure, I can't concentrate for as long as I'd like but these people couldn't sit still for 15 seconds.
falcolas 4y ago
We can't seem to have a discussion about neurological disorders without someone denying the existence - while trying to appear like they are not - of some of the best explored neurological disorders based on some fuzzy skepticism that displays they have read none of the vast swaths of scientific studies that exist on the topic. > By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent? Easy: is the severity of the ADHD and Autistic traits you exhibit low enough that they do not impair your ability to function on a day-to-day basis in society? If not, you don't have ADHD or Autism. What does not impaired look like compared to impaired? - Struggling to focus on something for minutes or hours, vs. being unable to concentrate on a task. - Occasionally struggling with overcoming mental hurdles to perform a task vs frequently being incapable - yes, literally incapable, no matter the reward or punishment - of performing a task. - Focusing on a task you enjoy while still being aware of the state of your body - keeping reasonably hydrated, fed, and use of the facilities - vs. not being aware. - Occasionally forgetting words - like "watch" - or names, vs frequently. - An occasionally compromised working memory (typically with an outside trigger like alcohol or lack of sleep), compared to a permanently compromised working memory. Compromised being able to store 4 items in your short term memory when the average for the populace is 7. - Occasionally forgetting that items and people exist if they are not in your direct sight, versus constantly forgetting, where constantly means remembering is the exception instead of the norm. One final note - ADHD is not some new disorder unique to the TikTok generation. ADHD has been formally recognized and studied as far back as 1902 by Sir George Frederick Still.
- bobkazamakis 4y ago
  >Easy: is the severity of the ADHD and Autistic traits you exhibit low enough that they do not impair your ability to function on a day-to-day basis in society? If not, you don't have ADHD or Autism. Easy: define "function on a day-to-day basis in society"
  - corobo 4y ago
    They kinda went into that in the rest of the comment after what you quoted but if you need more there's a couple books that contain this information too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivity_disorder#Subtypes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivit...
anotherman554 4y ago
Medical diagnosis are man made labels created by committee. If I say having blond hair is a medical condition then I can absolutely do a falsifiable test of whether you have blond hair. So the issue isn't so much falsifiability per see but instead the whether you trust the judgement of people who decide what is "normal" or "not normal".
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  Diagnoses are defined through research. The committee part is just about updating diagnostic manuals to reflect current consensus. New diagnoses need to be proven to be distinct entities(i.e not redundant) and clinically meaningful. And they specifically need to have a diagnostic test. Having blond hair has a diagnostic test, sure, but that diagnostic test does not in itself constitute a distinct, clinically useful diagnosis. Of course hair colour can change due to medical conditions, but then the hair colour would obviously be just one symptom of some set of conditions that may have caused it.
  - anotherman554 4y ago
    I do not agree. You can research how much of the population has blond hair, and how much this diverges from the "typical" hair color. But the decision to define or not define blond hair as a medical condition is a value call because the definition of a medical condition is ultimately that which people call a medical condition. And whether something is clinically useful isn't the standard for defining a condition, because ability to successfully treat a disease isn't a standard in deciding whether something is a disease and because therapy isn't limited to people who have diseases. (Unless professionals are now calling marital problems a disease?)
    - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
      You can agree or disagree, but the fact is that diagnoses almost always include a mandatory requirement that the condition has a significant negative impact on the patient's life. It's not merely a value judgment, and it's definitely not an arbitray judgement. The AMA or the CDC can't just decide that blod hair is now a medical disorder for no other reason than it would be helpful to your strawman. Clearly a lot of research and deliberation goes into these decisions. That's why new revisions of the DSM literally take years to complete.
mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
Source: I've been diagnosed with severe ADHD on 4 occasions(mostly retests for due diligence reasons after switching psychiatrist) Generally by having a full workup with a psychiatrist. They will do various interviews. Possibly might have to interview parents and teachers in pediatric cases or in adult cases where ADHD was not diagnosed in childhood(childhood onset is a diagnostic requirement for adult ADHD). In more difficult cases a neuropsychologist might be consulted and can perform various neurological tests to more thoroughly rule out other disorder. There's some promising work on blood biomarkers and brain imaging but nothing in clinical use yet afaik.
- BeFlatXIII 4y ago
  > childhood onset is a diagnostic requirement for adult ADHD What would be the diagnosis for adult-onset ADHD symptoms without a childhood history of those symptoms?
  - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
    Theoretically, any type to damage to or dysfunction in the frontal lobe which is affected by ADHD can manifest similar symptoms. There are some nutritional deficiencies that can cause a false positive for ADHD(zinc, possibly omega-3). There's also some curious cases of ADHD manifesting due to an very specific type of potassium imbalance. Though AFAIK the only known cases of this have been genetic. It's probably also possible that childhood ADHD could have been "hiding" in childhood, if say your childhood environment was very ADHD-compatible it might not have been enough of a problem to be detected then, but become a problem in adulthood as your environment and responsibilites change. Probably you could make an argument for a diagnosis of adult ADHD in a case like that if there's at least a family history of ADHD.
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faeriechangling 4y ago
I've spent a long time in disability communities, falsifiability gets very little respect, and "gatekeeping" is generally expressly or implicitly taboo. So with Autism, probably the most common disqualifier in practice is that the disorder requires childhood presentation and a lot of people don't know this. So somebody will come in, say "oh I wasn't autistic at all as a child, but I felt very autistic as a teenager, so I asked a doctor, and he said I wasn't autistic". People will respond with "oh, doctors don't know anything about autism, they underdiagnose minorities and women all the time, that proves it" and "oh, women actually don't present as autistic in childhood, they can just be masking, but that doesn't mean they aren't actually autistic". This happens EVERY time, especially if a woman is involved, and means that you can't falsify the idea that somebody was autistic in childhood. I have been banned once for saying that disabled people should doubt other peoples disabilities (on the grounds of preventing exploitation and misallocation of resources), I got told that I was spreading ableist myths that disabled people are responsible for other disabled people lacking resources, that I was reinforcing the ableist myth that disabled people are just exploiting non-disabled people (of course, disabled people do just as much for the able as the able do for them, and thus there is no advantage to faking disability), that it was inappropriate to talk about doubting disabilities on an autism community, and that they wished I had a number of painful disabilities that I couldn't receive pain medication for because I wasn't believed.
- watwut 4y ago
  You are treating "not presenting symptoms as kids" and "not being diagnosed as a kid" interchangeably.
  - faeriechangling 4y ago
    I'm not, I'm in no way saying that explicitly or implicitly. I do not even remotely conflate these two things. It is possible to show symptoms as a child, not get diagnosed as a child, and get diagnosed as an adult. I have zero issue with that. Here's the exact phrasing of the criteria https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html >Symptoms must be present in the early developmental period (but may not become fully manifest until social demands exceed limited capacities, or may be masked by learned strategies in later life). There's nothing in the diagnosis that says you need to be diagnosed as a child. I adamantly do not believe that's required for a diagnosis in any way shape or form.
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corobo 4y ago
> "By what process can someone reasonably determine that they are NOT neurodivergent?" Isn't that called differential diagnosis? For me they were essentially post-diagnosing childhood ADHD. Not much of my present existence was relevant other than the effects it had on my life now (whether I need meds or not). Sure I could have lied but it would have been a hell of a lie to build and keep straight across my appointments. I was also asked if I'd heard of ADHD from TikTok.. not sure what the result would have been if I had.

madeofpalk 4y ago

It's not just related to tiktok, but there definitely was a strong fetisisation of ADHD going on which seemed to peak in 2020-2021 (but still there).

Ensorceled 4y ago
20 years ago, when my step kids were young, people also said ADHD and Autism was a "fad" and "overdiagnosed". People have been talking like this since at least the 90's and always claiming it's a new, recent, thing.
- falcolas 4y ago
  Heck, my sister was diagnosed (and I wish I had been diagnosed) in the 80's. Plus, before it got the name ADD (and after, ADHD), it was studied by the names "Hyperactive child syndrome", "Hyperkinetic reaction of childhood", and a few others. This has been recognized and studied for over a century.
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falcolas 4y ago

> The only half-convincing defense I've heard of it is that it could, maybe, theoretically, disseminate information about illnesses to people who don't have the money to see a professional Another thing TikTok does is provide a venue for sharing stories - "you're not alone" - and sharing coping mechanisms. Good things.

albrewer 4y ago

On the flip side, I asked my psych to take an ADHD test because I found the stuff at /r/ADHDmemes consistently hit far too close to home to be a coincidence.

overthemoon 4y ago
Do you mind if I ask how that went? I've circled these issues before. For me, I suspect the underlying issue is something else, but I'm curious about your experience.
- albrewer 4y ago
  I just asked to be screened for ADHD. The guy was pretty skeptical, and the test would have been out of pocket with or without insurance. In the actual test, you had to watch a square flash on the screen at random intervals and click a clicker if it flashed on the bottom. That's it. It took an hour. Afterward, you get your results based on mistakes and reaction time over time. The data and statistics associated with it are really interesting, too.

chemmail 4y ago

I've noticed this starting to carry over. I watch some Mr Beast things after listening to an awesome interview with him. But his videos are almost unwatchable. It's like 20 tick toks strung together. They just edit it that way to get the tik tock crowd. Very infuriating. How do you learn or digest good information if you get blasted with 99% shit every 15 seconds?