"Are we over-diagnosing attention deficit hyperactivity, especially in boys, because we have less tolerance of what were once understood and accepted as normal kid behaviors?"

'Boys will be boys' is a stupid viewpoint, and always has been. Yes, boys act differently than girls, but they still do stupid shiat that doesn't fly with the adult world (one hopes, anyway). If it's brought on by an imbalanced brain chemistry (I stress IF) it needs to be addressed.

"A child with ADHD is easily distracted, hyperactive and impulsive. More than overactive, these children often can't sit still long enough to respond to a question or listen to a story. Some can't slow down between idea and action, leaving them with more than their share of sprained ankles from leaping off a desk or fence. "

Newsflash, bad journalist; I was diagnosed after years of school problems, several days of psych testing, and NEVER had hyperactivity. I still catch myself wandering way off course on a regular basis, and yet I am not vibrating out of my chair (or jumping off high points) by any definition. Nice inclusion of the word 'some', while painting the lot of us as crazy thrill seekers.

ladyfortuna: "Are we over-diagnosing attention deficit hyperactivity, especially in boys, because we have less tolerance of what were once understood and accepted as normal kid behaviors?"


Yes!

The rest was tl;dr - no, not really. I did read it, but it brings up some very interesting (and obvious) questions.

Are we over-diagnosing these days?

If not, were we underdiagnosing in past decades?

And if not, what changed?

It is not that children didn't have ADHD  50 years ago. They did. They were the class daydreamers or fidgets who either dropped out in high school or were sent to shop class.


Is there any evidence whatsoever to support this statement? Obviously some kids used to have ADHD but were they the "daydreamers" and "fidgets" (whatever that means) and were they really the same as the kids who dropped out or were "sent to shop class"?

I would guess that "daydreamers" aren't the same as impulsive kids who can't sit still, and who jump off fences and fall out of their desks.

I hate it when authors just pull stuff out of their ass in an article otherwise meant to cite facts and quote experts.

Then she quotes several paragraphs from the NYTimes article before telling people to read the whole thing before commenting.

Why the Fark is Fark not just linking to the NYTimes article? All this author did is add her own unfounded supposition.

#1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

#2 boys are starting to fall behind in school and are being diagnosed more often with ADD/ADHD

These two facts couldn't possibly be related.

CDC ADHD FYI BS IMHO

I suspect that I probably have some sort of attention deficit problem.

I have a lot of trouble concentrating on things that I don't find extremely interesting. As you can imagine, this makes work very difficult unless there is some new and interesting thing to learn and try. I'm not bouncing off the walls though.

What exactly do the drugs do?

RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

How much could recess possibly cost?

And 5 out of 5 doctors get wads of cash to push drugs. Go out and get some fresh air kiddies.

Ant: RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

How much could recess possibly cost?
 It's not so much the cost of recess, it has more to do with the amount of instructional time they are required to squeeze into the day.

Recess, PE and Lunch have all been squeezed down to size.

It's not ADHD, it's hormones and boredom.

Kids used to play outdoors and now many of them aren't allowed.
Without the additional activity it's not surprising we would see new illnesses popping up.

When I was about 9 I was a bit of a problem child, to the point of being diagnosed with ADD, mental retardation (apparently to secure funding for a Teacher's Assistant) and was a little arsehole on top of things. My parents finally decided to put me in swimming, and life got a whole lot better when I had regular, physical exercise. I've noticed the same thing with my children, in that when they get grumpy and stroppy on holidays (especially Christmas) that taking them for a long, arduous walk has an amazing effect on calming them down.

The fact is that exercise is very beneficial to the developing brain, and whatever kind of brain it is that adults are supposed to have, in the sense that exercise helps delay the onset of dementia and so on.

The problem is less that 'boys will be boys' (bullshiat), than that our bodies aren't maintained through healthy diet, exercise, and so on, and that our health and well-being is something that puts at a competitive disadvantage to those who would sacrifice their own health and well-being to get ahead.

Ant: RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

How much could recess possibly cost?

Well look at it this way: They get so much money for educational programs, but recess isn't an educational program, yet costs them money (i.e. teachers supervising the precious snowflakes).  This especially true in areas that have little or no tax base: they get money from the state and maybe even from the Feds for said educational programs.  They don't get money to pay for teachers to supervise.

A little physical activity goes a long way.

//Same holds true for dogs.

Pharma Execs' yachts don't purchase themselves.

ladyfortuna: "Are we over-diagnosing attention deficit hyperactivity, especially in boys, because we have less tolerance of what were once understood and accepted as normal kid behaviors?"

'Boys will be boys' is a stupid viewpoint, and always has been. Yes, boys act differently than girls, but they still do stupid shiat that doesn't fly with the adult world (one hopes, anyway). If it's brought on by an imbalanced brain chemistry (I stress IF) it needs to be addressed.


Your error here is that somehow, children should be acting as if they're in the adult world.

ladyfortuna: "Are we over-diagnosing attention deficit hyperactivity, especially in boys, because we have less tolerance of what were once understood and accepted as normal kid behaviors?"

'Boys will be boys' is a stupid viewpoint, and always has been. Yes, boys act differently than girls, but they still do stupid shiat that doesn't fly with the adult world (one hopes, anyway). If it's brought on by an imbalanced brain chemistry (I stress IF) it needs to be addressed.

"A child with ADHD is easily distracted, hyperactive and impulsive. More than overactive, these children often can't sit still long enough to respond to a question or listen to a story. Some can't slow down between idea and action, leaving them with more than their share of sprained ankles from leaping off a desk or fence. "

Newsflash, bad journalist; I was diagnosed after years of school problems, several days of psych testing, and NEVER had hyperactivity. I still catch myself wandering way off course on a regular basis, and yet I am not vibrating out of my chair (or jumping off high points) by any definition. Nice inclusion of the word 'some', while painting the lot of us as crazy thrill seekers.

I have two boys, the 8 year old is smart as a whip and mostly sits around reading books or playing on the computer, the 5 year old is a non-stop perpetual motion machine running, jumping climbing, throwing things and can't sit still for anything. One of them has ADHD and it's not the 5 year old.  There is a HUGE difference between being an active child and having an attention deficit disorder.

I have two teenaged boys who are exactly as people have been describing in this thread.  Normal kids who get really weird if they don't burn off enough energy.

Society in general is taking away the masculinity boys need (roughhousing, doing crazy things on the playground, etc.) and expecting them to act like little girls who sit perfectly at attention all day.  It's not going to happen--boys aren't built that way.

When they were younger and acting up I would literally throw baseballs down the street and force them to play fetch, among other silly things to keep them running around.  They always came back into the house ready and able to pay attention.

You know what kids need more of today? Medicine! And the AMA and Big Pharma are here to provide it!

But don't you dare blame these lightly-te$ted toxic combinations of concoctions that cause homicidal and suicidal thoughts when junior goes and shoots up a school. Blame an inanimate object instead!

I didn't get to the whole article but I thought the part where

ladyfortuna:  I was diagnosed after years of school problems, several days of psych testing, and NEVER had hyperactivity. I still catch myself wandering way off course on a regular basis, and yet I am not vibrating out of my chair (or jumping off high points) by any definition. Nice inclusion of the word 'some', while painting the lot of us as crazy thrill seekers.

True for me as well.

I think there's going to come a day when we find that a lot of people with impulse control issues don't have ADD or ADHD, and vice versa, and that we've been mistaking impulse control problems with ADD/ADHD all along.  Once that happens, the number of people diagnosed with ADD is going to fall.

Woman just dont know how boys work. Men arent the ones diagnosing their children as having problems and acting improperly. Its the mothers who have some stupid ideal of how their boy should act.

Newsflash woman dont know shiat about boys growing up. So they take their little boy to the doctor when hes acting in a way mommy didnt act as a kid. Doctors gives him pharmaceutical grade meth and you feed it to him hoping it will calm him down. He doesnt really have adhd so it just wires him up more and you go to get his dose increased.

Ahhh the cycle of life from a stupid person is so epic.

Ant:

What exactly do the drugs do?

The drugs help you concentrate if you have sufficient motivation to do the work to begin with.  If you can't get yourself to do the work at all, the meds aren't going to help you.   Adderall doesn't create motivation out of thin air; it helps you take the motivation you already have and stick to the work you're already doing by helping your brain tune out distractions.

Along this same line, if you're one of those lucky people who can tune out distractions on your own, the drugs probably won't do much except make you high and/or keep you from falling asleep.

severedtoe: Ant: RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

How much could recess possibly cost?
 It's not so much the cost of recess, it has more to do with the amount of instructional time they are required to squeeze into the day.

Recess, PE and Lunch have all been squeezed down to size.

Perhaps we should bring back the Presidential Physical Fitness Challenge (or whatever it was called way back when I was in school) and make passing it mandatory, sorta like how standardized academic tests are mandatory?

c4rr0tc4k3: Woman just dont know how boys work. Men arent the ones diagnosing their children as having problems and acting improperly. Its the mothers who have some stupid ideal of how their boy should act.

Newsflash woman dont know shiat about boys growing up. So they take their little boy to the doctor when hes acting in a way mommy didnt act as a kid. Doctors gives him pharmaceutical grade meth and you feed it to him hoping it will calm him down. He doesnt really have adhd so it just wires him up more and you go to get his dose increased.

Ahhh the cycle of life from a stupid person is so epic.


I'm female and my male doctor diagnosed me with ADHD.

They need to triple the flouridation in school drinking fountains.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that high school kids who have had their brains stimulated by TV, video games, computers, Iphone/Droids, game pads etc etc for nearly their whole life will most likely be restless while sitting down with no stimulation, bored reading from a book that isn't pictures, and certainly unable to follow singular person talking for a prolonged amount of time. It's not ADHD it's an over stimulated brain.

You know the world is farked up when energetic children are considered a problem. But i suppose it's difficult to get them to sit in a cubicle for 40 years after school.

Then when they retire, they lament for the energy they had when they were young.

I totally have "ADD".  I think it has most to do with the fact that I spend way too much side inside and not nearly enough outside.  I had great grades in school, but often had report cards saying "He's smart, but is always distracted, looking out the window or doodling or paying attention to something else across the room."  Even today as an adult I'm still like that, which is tough considering I'm in software.  The only time my head's not off in the clouds our bouncing from one thing to another is when I'm being active outside or playing a video game.  Otherwise, the world is just too damn boring and I simply can't handle the lack of stimuli.  For me, I think most of my ADD is related much more to Nature Deficit Disorder than some mental illness.

Bullshiat.

Simply put, humans are not hard-wired to sit in a chair and listen to lecture for 5 hours a day.

Back in the Stone Age, our teenagers were out hunting Woolly Mammoths.

At what point does it go from mental disorder to just being how people work?
Apparently not 1 in 5. 1 in 4? 1 in 3? We've got to be approaching it.

I supposedly have ADHD. I can ask somebody a question I truly want to know the answer to and then not hear the immediate response because I was distracted by that thing over there. I honestly believe it's a product of evolution. In the society we've got now it's a detriment, but in a setting more similar to the environment we spent much more time evolving for? My focus on only the latest stimulus, such as the branch that just moved over there or the twig cracking behind us, could be pretty handy.

This is, of course, a completely separate thing from inattentiveness brought about by lack of physical exertion. Anybody confusing AD(H)D for that is just retarded or on the take and shouldn't be allowed to practice medicine. People aren't built to sit still all day using their brains exclusively, even if it did manage to be the best* way for us to function as a society or species.

Although I heard a lot of people saying the new DSM would classify pretty much everybody as having a mental disorder. Good news for pharmaceutical companies and those who would control you. You've got a mental disorder, no (x) for you! You're also now required to medicate with (y) if you want to do (z).

Or maybe I'm just nuts. Probably that.

*Philosophizing on how to qualify best goes here?

It's those immunizations that are causing so much ADHD.

RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

Completely untrue. Budgets have not gone down, they are just poorly spent. Every year more is spent on salary, benefits, and overhead as opposed to actual education. Teaching is the epitome of big union labor and shows it in every respect.

Underfunded gets as old as the underpaid educator meme. In reality they are overcompensated, if you don't believe it look how hard it is to get a full time gig.

If you feed your kid mostly sugar for breakfast, don't expect them to sit still in class.

severedtoe: Ant: RyansPrivates: #1 we cut funding to schools to the core, so that they have to drop or diminish PE and recess.

How much could recess possibly cost?
 It's not so much the cost of recess, it has more to do with the amount of instructional time they are required to squeeze into the day.

Recess, PE and Lunch have all been squeezed down to size.

The lunch at the school I work at is 26 minutes. HR skirts around this less-than-30-minute-break issue by pointing at the passing periods before and after lunch and adding that time to our lunch break.

HR conveniently forgets that some of our special ed kids prefer eating in a quiet environment (well, the kids who are sensitive to loud noises and/or chaotic environments) and the only 'quiet environment' locations available are the teachers' lounges. The kids then ask for help with homework and before you know it, lunch is over and you haven't eaten a bite.

That could just be my school district, though.  My district does have a reputation for skimping on employee wages and benefits.

ladyfortuna: "Are we over-diagnosing attention deficit hyperactivity, especially in boys, because we have less tolerance of what were once understood and accepted as normal kid behaviors?"

Newsflash, bad journalist; I was diagnosed after years of school problems, several days of psych testing, and NEVER had hyperactivity. I still catch myself wandering way off course on a regular basis, and yet I am not vibrating out of my chair (or jumping off high points) by any definition. Nice inclusion of the word 'some', while painting the lot of us as crazy thrill seekers.

You're making a lot of assumptions there, champ. Which by the way is a bit of evidence towards ADHD...

Here's food for thought. The rise of diagnosis isn't primarily due to overzealous diagnosis, but due to the fact that the knowledge base and understanding of ADHD has improved and therefore, more boys are accurately diagnosed. On that same token, the assumption "We just have less tolerance for annoying boys" isn't necessarily true. What's to say that teachers and parents in the old days weren't driven just as crazy by an irritating ADHD kid? Maybe they were, and they weren't diagnosed because  HEY WHAT DO YOU KNOW the knowledge to achieve the diagnosis did not exist or was obscure bleeding-edge research.

More on your assumptions, you've assumed that hyperactivity is a necessary prerequisite for ADHD diagnosis. That is not true because in fact, there are actually two types of "ADHD", "ADD" and "ADHD". ADD is attention deficit minus hyperactivity (the H), and ADHD with the hyperactivity. It is absolutely possible to have ADHD/ADD without being a someone who bounces off the walls.

This research isn't pulled out of scientists asses, either. It's carefully and independently reviewed by clinical and laboratory data, even including direct brain imaging.

So you can believe whatever you want, and no one is forcing you to take medication or get treatment. It's your life. If you can manage without those things, then good on you. But it's not your place to make assumptions and then tell scientists they're wrong. It's not your place to fill parents minds with your made up ideas so that they don't go treat their child who would subsequently go on to decades of suffering.

What IS your place is to leave the professional "lookers at things" (scientists) to do the looking at things. Because that's exactly what you're doing: looking at your life and making conclusions. It's just that they are the professionals at doing the same thing.

Mind your own business and move along now.

StrikitRich: It's not ADHD, it's hormones and boredom.

I keep telling my son he will go insane. He doesn't believe me yet. I finally got my wife to relate to "being a teenage boy" by describing it as 24hr PMS with priapism every farkIN DAY for years.

Baelz: I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that high school kids who have had their brains stimulated by TV, video games, computers, Iphone/Droids, game pads etc etc for nearly their whole life will most likely be restless while sitting down with no stimulation, bored reading from a book that isn't pictures, and certainly unable to follow singular person talking for a prolonged amount of time. It's not ADHD it's an over stimulated brain.

This.  As always in threads like this, I know that ADHD is a legitimate disorder, but I think that so many cases are caused by parents putting televisions and video games in kids' bedrooms and giving them their own iPhones as soon as they can walk (I'm always stunned at the number of two-year-olds with their own iPhones when I'm at the doctor's office).  When you're used to constant stimulation, you're going to get antsy when you're deprived of it.

I also wonder how our modern diet affects ADHD and similar behaviors.  Surely all those preservatives, chemicals, food dyes, and so forth play a role.

Crackers Are a Family Food: This. As always in threads like this, I know that ADHD is a legitimate disorder, but I think that so many cases are caused by parents putting televisions and video games in kids' bedrooms and giving them their own iPhones as soon as they can walk (I'm always stunned at the number of two-year-olds with their own iPhones when I'm at the doctor's office). When you're used to constant stimulation, you're going to get antsy when you're deprived of it.

Correlation is not the same as causation. While what you say may be true, it may be the other way around. Maybe ADHD causes over use of video games and iPhones because using devices which grant quick, controllable, easy gratification causes the brain to release neurochemicals, some of which (like dopamine) help reduce symptoms.

Think outside the box, man. Just as scientists aren't always right (as this circlejerk thread mostly says), the Soccer Mom/Holistic Health/Alternative Treatment/I Know Better Than Thou crowds aren't always right either. They are sometimes, but definitely not as much as you'd like to think as you wank yourself.

StrikitRich: It's not ADHD, it's hormones and boredom.

FALSE DICHOTOMY ALERT

meat0918: A little physical activity goes a long way.

I'm pretty sure the context of the thread and the implication made by this post qualifies for FALSE DICHOTOMY ALERT

It's not really a disorder if 20% of the population has it...  More like just another trait exhibited by a greater than unusual percent of the population

I had ADHD in high school and didn't know it.  My grades and social life were totally destroyed.
I had ADHD in college and didn't know it.  Same result, and I failed both socially and academically.

/ sure could have used a diagnosis back then.  Stumbled through an extra decade of life before realizing I have ADHD in spades.

ADD's definitely real, but often misunderstood because it's a complicated disorder that can manifest a host of symptoms, some seemingly contradictory.  Best analogy I can think of: it's not that you're simply overheating, but that you have a faulty thermostat: you're often too hot or too cold, and sometimes you get stuck in the wrong position.

In my case: my thoughts often race really fast, which is good for creativity but in excess can distract you or cause you to get lost in tangents.  Just as often however, I get hyper-focused on one thing and lose track of time, which is good for working on a complex problem but in excess can cause you to get mired in minor details for hours.  It's not that I can't concentrate, I just can't govern what i concentrate on or for how long.  I try to multitask when I should focus, and I get obsessed when I should keep moving.

bhcompy: It's not really a disorder if 20% of the population has it...  More like just another trait exhibited by a greater than unusual percent of the population

Whether or not it's actually a disorder is a moot point when you consider that whatever it is, disorder or "trait", other people and society treat ADD/ADHD people badly. Many of the issues of ADHD, like quick to frustration and anger, are a result of decades of either mistreatment by others or accidental personal screw-ups resulting in bad treatment from others. When an ADHD person flares up to quick frustration it's not necessarily due to an inherent brain dysfunction but an inner thought along the lines of "Not this again from another person ARRRRRRRRRG".

Whoever in this thread is saying pshaw about mental disorders like ADHD and wish it would be diagnosed less, then quit blaming others and hoping someone else will fix the problem. Quit criticizing other people's lives which you have no good way of understanding, quit criticizing professional scientists who know much more than you, look to yourselves. Start treating people with mental disorders better. Give them a helping hand. Give them the benefit of the doubt. Let people slip up a little without crushing them in punishment. Then you might find that all the ADHD people have a brain quirk and only a brain quirk, not a brain quirk which causes decades of failed relationships, school, and careers, and a lot less of them will seek treatment.

Eddie Ate Dynamite: I supposedly have ADHD.

Try a gluten-free diet.  It'll supposedly fix your supposed ADHD.

foo monkey: Eddie Ate Dynamite: I supposedly have ADHD.

Try a gluten-free diet.  It'll supposedly fix your supposed ADHD.

How much real research has been done on this gluten free thing? It may actually have some merit to it, but it also seems to be a fad. The loudest proponents of it that I've heard are people I wouldn't really accept that sort of advice from. Saying gluten causes problems is one thing, but I've been told a gluten free (and raw foods) diet is literally the cure for cancer.

/Are you threatening me?!

Eddie Ate Dynamite: foo monkey: Eddie Ate Dynamite: I supposedly have ADHD.

Try a gluten-free diet.  It'll supposedly fix your supposed ADHD.

How much real research has been done on this gluten free thing? It may actually have some merit to it, but it also seems to be a fad. The loudest proponents of it that I've heard are people I wouldn't really accept that sort of advice from. Saying gluten causes problems is one thing, but I've been told a gluten free (and raw foods) diet is literally the cure for cancer.

/Are you threatening me?!

My son's psychiatrist rattled that off in addition to red dye #40, sugar, etc. She shrugged and basically said "This is a brain chemical. The healthier your body is, the better it will be at self-regulation". Honestly I get the impression that she didn't think any of those would be a smoking gun in my son's case, but she did seem to think that some kids of of varying intensity of ADD had been strongly helped by addressing those potential... eh, poisons, but it was on a HIGHLY individual basis.

As for actual research, I ain't heard nothing yet. Seems like real research would be years and years away.