

Seeking an Objective Test for Attention Disorder - tokenadult
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/01/health/01attention.html

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tokenadult
In a book I read by Russell Barkley, one of the doyens of ADHD research, he
said that if screening questionnaires were boiled down to just one question,
the best question to ask would be "Are you easily distracted?" That question
goes a long way toward identifying children or adults who have issues with
attention control. He says multiple question screening questionnaires are
still more reliable, but that one question about ease of distraction has
enough sensitivity and specificity

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensitivity_and_specificity>

to be useful for brief screening.

What I find interesting, as a Baby Boomer, is how much the paradigm has
changed. When I was a kid, only children who were "hyperactive" were
considered to have a problem. People who had trouble concentrating were not
considered to have a psychological [after edit: or medical] issue, and of
course in those days it was thought that few or no adults had any such issue
[after edit: as "hyperactivity" or "attention deficit."] There does seem to
have be evidence that many people grow out of either the hyperactive or
inattentive type of ADD/ADHD, and that impulse control and attention focus are
learnable, but apparently they are more learnable for some people than for
others under matched training conditions. The medical interventions do appear
to be helpful in their own right.

~~~
j_baker
"What I find interesting, as a Baby Boomer, is how much the paradigm has
changed. When I was a kid, only children who were "hyperactive" were
considered to have a problem. People who had trouble concentrating were not
considered to have a psychological issue, and of course in those days it was
thought that few or no adults had any such issue."

More than likely when you were growing up, homosexuality _was_ considered a
mental illness. We've learned a lot since then. :-)

"There does seem to have be evidence that many people grow out of either the
hyperactive or inattentive type of ADD/ADHD, and that impulse control and
attention focus are learnable, but apparently they are more learnable for some
people than for others under matched training conditions."

You don't grow out of bonafide ADHD. It's with you for life much like OCD or
bipolar disorder. You can learn to cope with it better, but you can't really
make it go away (even with drugs though they help a lot).

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jschuur
Tests for AD(H)D focus on 2 different aspects: attention and
hyperactivity/impulsiveness. Key to any diagnosis is not the occurrence of
individual symptoms, but how many you have in each category, the degree to
which you have them, whether they appear in different settings, for longer
than 6 months and they are actually life impairing. Simply being
forgetful/distracted/dyslexic/argumentative etc by itself isn't a clear cut
sign that you have AD(H)D, as they may have entirely different causes.

Slightly unrelated, but if anyone is interested in reading more about the
topic, Edward Hallowell's 1994 book Driven to Distraction is a seminal book on
the topic and includes some of the classic signs used to analyze the
condition.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driven_to_Distraction>

His 2005 follow-up Delivered from Distraction, focuses on how to make the most
out of it if you have it and harness your strengths (creativity, charisma,
energy, intelligence).

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j_baker
> “It’s essentially a dull, boring task,” he said of the Quotient system, “so
> do you want to medicate your child to pay attention to dull, boring tasks?”

Absolutely. Real life isn't always fun and games. Of course, medication won't
make your child enjoy those dull, boring tasks. But it will at least make them
capabale of paying attention to them.

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johnl87
This is just my personal experience with friends who had add. My previous 2
roommates at two different places were taking ADD pills. Somehow after their
pills ran out they kept complaining how they're not gonna be able to do their
homework, study, etc, yet they were able to sit and play complicated computer
games for hours on end.

~~~
joshuacc
That's not surprising, since (despite the name) ADD doesn't imply an inability
to focus at all times. Those with legitimate ADD have an unusually hard time
directing maintaining focus except under highly stimulating conditions.
Complicated computer games are one of the few things that an ADD person is
likely to maintain focus with.

That's not to say that your roommates cases were legitimate. They may not have
been. But your description isn't necessarily evidence of a mis-diagnosis.

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eavc
tl; dnr

Just kidding. In reality, this is a very helpful read. I'm wondering whether I
have an attentional disorder myself, and many of the same questions the author
closes with are my questions.

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tjmaxal
So will dissenters now say that we are just treating people for the test and
not for real life?

~~~
eavc
That's exactly what the dissenter in the article is asking.

