Why I Believe that Attention Deficit Disorder is a Myth
by Thomas Armstrong, Ph.D.
When parents hear me say that attention deficit disorder is a myth, they sometimes become very upset. They think I’m saying that their kids aren’t jumpy, distractible, forgetful, impulsive, or disorganized. That’s not what I’m saying at all. It’s quite obvious to me that our nation’s children have probably never been so hyperactive. The question is, what accounts for this? Is it a medical disorder called ADD (or ADHD as it’s sometimes called)? I think not. I think instead that what we’ve learned to call ADD is instead a number of things all jumbled up together under this simplistic label.
Kids can be hyperactive for any number of reasons: because they’re anxious or depressed, because they’re allergic to milk, because they’re bored with school, because they have a different kind of mind and aren’t being challenged, because they’re over-stimulated from television and video games. I could go on. The point is that the ADD label makes is too easy to ignore what might be going on beneath the surface of things. "Oh, he has ADD? Whew! Glad we know what the problem is now." But perhaps we don’t really know at all.
Although there is a great deal of support from the medical and scientific community for ADD, once one looks into the literature, things become less clear. Nobody can actually tell you, for example, how many kids have ADD. Though the literature traditionally says 3-5% of all children have ADD, I’ve seen statistics in textbooks that have ranged from .019% (in England where its far less common) to 10% and above. ADD is in the eyes of the beholder.
Many of the "tests" that are used to diagnose ADD are flawed. The behavior rating scales that ask parents to rate their kids on a scale from I to 5, for instance, in terms of hyperactivity, impulsivity and so forth, are very subjective and parents and teachers often don’t agree on what they see in the same child. The continuous performance tests that are often used to diagnose for ADD are a joke. One of them is a box that sits on a table. The child is told that random numbers will appear in a screen on the box. They are instructed to press the button below the screen whenever a 9 is followed by a 1. What a stupid task! Yet on the basis of this, children are being diagnosed and having their medication levels adjusted.
May 30th, 2009 at 21:26
Finally! Someone who shares my opinion. We ‘just’ need to start looking at children from a different angle and try to understand and guide them from there. I also believe that a lot of these kids are trying to show us something about ourselves/our world. They often react to their environment. There’s a lot more to say about this. My goal is to protect and help guide these kids.