Inhibitory processes in adults with persistent childhood onset ADHD.

The theory that attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) stems from a deficit in an executive behavioral inhibition process has been little studied in adults, where the validity of ADHD is in debate. This study examined, in high-functioning young adults with persistent ADHD and a control group, 2 leading measures of inhibitory control: the antisaccad task and the negative priming task. ADHD adults showed weakened ability to effortfully stop a refle ve or anticipated oculomotor response but had normal ability to automatically suppress irrelevant information. Results suggest that an inhibitory deficit in ADHD is confined to effortful inhibition of motor response, that antisaccade and negative priming tasks index distinct inhibition systems, and that persistence of ADHD symptoms into adulthood is associated with persistence of executive motor inhibition deficits.

[1]  Joseph Biederman,et al.  Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in Adults , 2000, JAMA.

[2]  R. Douglas,et al.  Frontal lobe lesions in man cause difficulties in suppressing reflexive glances and in generating goal-directed saccades , 2004, Experimental Brain Research.

[3]  D. Johnson.  ADHD in Adulthood: A Guide to Current Theory, Diagnosis, and Treatment , 2003 .

[4]  J. Nigg,et al.  Is ADHD a disinhibitory disorder? , 2001, Psychological bulletin.

[5]  D. Hommer,et al.  Executive function oculomotor tasks in girls with ADHD. , 2000, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[6]  J. Nigg.  On inhibition/disinhibition in developmental psychopathology: views from cognitive and personality psychology and a working inhibition taxonomy. , 2000, Psychological bulletin.

[7]  D. J. Olmi,et al.  Brown Attention-Deficit Disorder Scales , 2000 .

[8]  Andrew R. A. Conway.  The time-course of negative priming: Little evidence for episodic trace retrieval , 1999, Memory & cognition.

[9]  R T Zacks,et al.  Suppression of reflexive saccades in younger and older adults: Age comparisons on an antisaccade task , 1999, Memory & cognition.

[10]  K. Kipp,et al.  Inhibition and Mental Effort in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder , 1999 .

[11]  B. Corbett,et al.  Neuropsychological performance of adults evidencing Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. , 1999, Archives of clinical neuropsychology : the official journal of the National Academy of Neuropsychologists.

[12]  D. Munoz,et al.  Control of Purposive Saccadic Eye Movements and Visual Fixation in Children with Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder , 1999 .

[13]  H. Deubel,et al.  Current oculomotor research : physiological and psychological aspects , 1999 .

[14]  David L. Strayer,et al.  Inhibitory deficits in Tourette syndrome: a function of comorbidity and symptom severity. , 1998, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[15]  B. Pennington,et al.  A neuropsychological examination of the underlying deficit in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: frontal lobe versus right parietal lobe theories. , 1998, Developmental psychology.

[16]  R. Klein,et al.  Adult psychiatric status of hyperactive boys grown up. , 1998, The American journal of psychiatry.

[17]  A E Seiffert,et al.  Selective attention: a reevaluation of the implications of negative priming. , 1998, Psychological review.

[18]  A. Paolo,et al.  Utility of WAIS–R seven-subtest short form as applied to the standardization sample. , 1998 .

[19]  J. Nigg,et al.  Neuropsychological correlates of childhood attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: explainable by comorbid disruptive behavior or reading problems? , 1998, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[20]  O. Pomerleau,et al.  Adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: psychological test profiles in a clinical population. , 1997, The Journal of nervous and mental disease.

[21]  R. Barkley.  Behavioral inhibition, sustained attention, and executive functions: constructing a unifying theory of ADHD. , 1997, Psychological bulletin.

[22]  B. Pennington,et al.  Executive functions and developmental psychopathology. , 1996, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[23]  K. K. Harnishfeger,et al.  The development of cognitive inhibition: Theories, definitions, and research evidence , 1995 .

[24]  F. N. Dempster,et al.  Interference and inhibition in cognition: An historical perspective , 1995 .

[25]  Cynthia P. May,et al.  Determinants of negative priming. , 1995, Psychological bulletin.

[26]  D. Hommer,et al.  Eye movement task related to frontal lobe functioning in children with attention deficit disorder. , 1994, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[27]  Dc Washington.  Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th Ed. , 1994 .

[28]  P. Wender,et al.  The Wender Utah Rating Scale: an aid in the retrospective diagnosis of childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. , 1993, The American journal of psychiatry.

[29]  M. Posner,et al.  Lateralized Control of Eye Movements in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder , 1991, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.

[30]  Mary Ganguli,et al.  Diagnostic Interview Schedule. , 1982, Archives of general psychiatry.

[31]  W. Kintsch,et al.  Memory and cognition , 1977 .