For example, a study conducted by the Center of Disease Control and Prevention shows that that rates of the disorder have jumped by 24% since 2001 and those children as young as three years of age are diagnosed with ADHD (CDC 2007:1).
Though our society has a substantial amount of knowledge about the diagnosis of ADHD, the functions of the disorder are still uncertain. In fact, recent findings have found that a specific dopamine receptor, the DRD4 7R allele, is associated with ADHD (Hartmann 2007:2).
The findings have lead scientist to believe that ADHD is an evolutionary survival asset, but the answer remains unclear.
To understand the phenomenon, we must consider the social and ecological environment in which our ancestors from the hunter-gatherer society may have experienced. Hence, the following paper examines ADHD as an evolutionary survival asset in pre-historic times and how it provides certain cognitive strengths to our children with ADHD. Thom Hartmann was one of the researchers who raised the topic of ADHD as an evolutionary survival asset. After conducting extensive research on ADHD during his undergraduate and post-graduate years, he noticed that children with ADHD had very similar traits of an exceptional hunter (Hartmann 2007:2).
For example, children with the disorder found repetitive tasks boring and this behavior was reflected in a nomadic hunter who despises mundane task and craves for novelty. Hartmann eventually created the Hunter versus Farmer Hypothesis, which states that all humans were nomadic hunter-gatherers for thousands of years but due to societal changes that led humans to adapt to agriculture, more people became farmers (Hartmann 2007:2).
The Term Paper on The Harmful Effects of ADHD Medication in Children
The medications and treatments for children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) were researched to expose the risks of pharmaceuticals and their side effects on young children. The medical risks of medications commonly used to treat children with ADHD were examined using published research and findings from pediatricians, physicians, scientists, and other health care ...
However, humans with ADHD, or the “hunters”, retained some of their primitive characteristics, such distractibility.
Meanwhile, the “farmers”, or the people who were able to adapt the agricultural society, became more focused, organized, and patient. Also, previous research had supported Hartmann’s hypothesis in that the DRD4 7R allele are more likely to be found in cultures that are nomadic. A recent study has suggested that the ADHD genotype is an evolutionary asset. Burgos and Acosta (2007) conducted a meta-analysis on genetics and clinical journals that examined ADHD as a genetic and evolutionary asset to human behavior.
They gathered journals that examined the following factors: (1) ADHD phenotype: categorical versus continuous, (2) ADHD genetic and association studies, (3) Allelic variants that are susceptible to ADHD. The researchers’ findings concluded that the ADHD phenotype represents a very common behavioral variant in nomadic populations. Burgos and Acosta also concluded that the disorder has provided our prehistoric ancestors because it increased their chances of survival and sexual reproduction. (E. g. aster response to predators, best hunting performance, more effective territorial defense and improvement of capacity for mobility and settling. Therefore, it was not uncommon that humans to be highly susceptible to ADHD due to their genetic makeup, especially in nomadic populations. Burgos and Acosta also noted that there are other theories that may explain the high genetic variation in population (Burgos et al 2007:235).
One of the examples they described was the Hartmann’s Hunter-Farmer hypothesis.
A limitation of the study is the author’s usage of words and number that may make it harder for readers to comprehend. Recent studies have shown that the DRD4 7R allele provides certain advantages for people of nomadic culture. Eisenberg, Campbell, Gray, and Sorenson (2008) examined the relationship between the 7R allele between body mass, height and food craving in two groups of men in a Kenyan tribe called Ariaal. About 103 men were recruited from an agricultural region of Songa and 102 nomadic males were recruited from a settlement of Kasuit Plateau.
The Term Paper on Beck's Cognitive Theory Of Depression
Depression is a “clinical syndrome” that affects many people in our society today, and has been documented for influencing humanity for over two-thousand-years (Beck, 1967, p. 3). Various pursuits have been initiated in effort to understand, diagnose, and treat this prevailing disorder. Although numerous attempts have been executed and several studies have assisted in the advancement of knowledge ...
The participants underwent interviews, anthropometrics, genotyping, and hormone measures. Results showed no difference in the frequency of the 7R allele between the two groups. Furthermore, there was no difference in food craving and height. However, the nomadic group had a higher body mass (BMI) than those who were in the agricultural community. Finding may suggest that hyperactivity and impulsivity, the key traits of ADHD, may have allowed nomadic men to retain more food resource and allowed them to defend against livestock raiders.
Further, findings show that the 7R allele allowed nomadic men to be more alert of their environment, which may protect them against social threat (Eisenberg et al. 2008:173).
The main limitation of the study is that the authors were unable to relate other genes, such as DRD2, may have played a role in the BMI, height, and food craving of the two groups. The authors elaborated the DRD2 in great details during the beginning of the article but failed to relate the allele to their findings.
Though the studies may exhibit some flaws, the main findings suggest that DRD4 7R allele may had provided our ancestors with certain cognitive advantages. Knowing this fact is very crucial because it provides us with the information that ADHD children are humans with different cognitive strengths. Furthermore, current research has shown that the 7R allele provides children with ADHD strengths in certain cognitive domains. Various studies have demonstrated that children with ADHD display strengths in certain cognitive domains, which may support the disorder as an evolutionary asset.
For example, Wells (2008) designed a study that explored the cognitive strengths and weakness of a group of children with ADHD in a selected private school. He hypothesized that gifted children with ADHD will have certain cognitive strengths to compensate for cognitive weakness that are associated with the disorder. The study consisted of 72 students with ADHD who were instructed to complete a psycho-education test. The test measured broad cognitive ability with relative performance (strength, weaknesses, or neither).
The Term Paper on Child Study Paper
The Child Study data I have gathered comes from the observation I have completed at Mission Bell Elementary School. Mission Bell Elementary School is a local school in Riverside. In the P. M preschool class there are 24 students, one teacher, and one assistant. The child I decided to observe is names Zoe. Zoe is 4 years and 10 months old. I immediately was drawn to Zoe because she had such a big ...
Data was recorded on a cross-tabulation sheet to examine the joint probability of these events. Furthermore, the test used a 2 by 3 chi-square to measure social context (norm versus study) with relative performance (strength, weakness, neither) to seven cognitive abilities. Results indicated that children with ADHD had a significantly different fluid reasoning, auditory processing, processing speed, short-term retrieval, and long-term retrieval from normal population (Wells 2008:3964).
The children showed strengths in the cognitive domain that related to fluid reasoning and short-term memory.
Meanwhile, the children also exhibited weaknesses in cognitive domains related to auditory processing and long-retrieval. Wells concluded that children with ADHD do exhibited certain cognitive strengths as well as cognitive weaknesses. A study has been done that examined the creativity of adolescents with ADHD and may suggest that they may have a slight advantage over their normal peers in certain cognitive domains relating to creativity. Abraham, Windmann, Siefen, Daum and Gunturkun (2006) examined the degree of creativity in adolescents with ADHD and compared their creativity with a group of healthy adolescent.
The ADHD group consisted of 11 participants and the control group consisted of 12 participants. Participants were given various experimental tasks, which included the conceptual expansion task, the recently activated knowledge task, the creative imagery task, and the alternate uses task. Results of the study indicate that the ADHD group exhibited selected cognitive advantages and disadvantages (Abraham et al. 2006:111) The main finding that the ADHD group outperformed the control group in the activated knowledge task. However, they did significantly worse in practicality measure of the creative imagery task.
Results also indicated that the ADHD group was able to generate more unique response on the recently activated knowledge task because they were able to ignore distractive contexts (Abraham et al. 2006:112) Furthermore, the two groups exhibited no differences in the alternative use task. Abraham concluded that the ADHD group exhibited strengths in task that require them to overcome constraining influences while they exhibited weaknesses in task that required them to generate new inventions. Ek, Fernell, Westerlund, Holmberg, Olsson, P and Gillberg (2007) examined the cognitive abilities of children with ADHD.
The Term Paper on Add Adhd People Children Child
... Program (IEP) for the ADHD child after assessing the child s strengths and weaknesses. Those involved are ... new can be an extremely laborious task. Often children with ADHD seem to be in fast ... people with ADHD to (help) like and accept themselves despite their disorder cognitive-behavioral therapy ... social skills training can help children learn new behaviors support groups connect people who have ...
Their methods consisted of giving cognitive test, WISC III, to 10- to 11-year-old children with (1) ADHD, (2) sub threshold ADHD and (3) milder attention and/or learning problems, and compare the data with other groups. Results indicate that children with ADHD had identical cognitive profiles (Ek et al 2007:757) However, they discovered that the ADHD and sub threshold AHDH group were better at areas demanding logical thinking, reasoning, and common sense.. A recent study examined that children who have wandering minds, a typical trait of ADHD, may have sharper problem solving and multi-tasking skills.
Davidson, Smallwood, and Levinson (2012) examined two controversial theories: (1) working memory (WM) maintains mind wondering when resources are used to focus on a task or (2) mind wondering persist without the support of WM but decreases while there is a demanding task present. Ninety-three members were from the University of Wisconsin community for experiment 1 and were instructed to complete a visual search task, WMC assessment, the Automated Operation (OSPAN) task. Experiment 2 was created to replicate the positive association between the working memory capacity (WMC) and thought-unrelated task (TUT).
Forty-five members of the University of Wisconsin community were recruited to complete a breath awareness experiment in three different time intervals, questionnaires, and OSPAN. Results show that the TUT increases when the working memory is maintaining it, which supports the theory that WM enables TUT to persist in situations that require little attention (Davidson et al 2012:378).
The finding suggest that individuals with higher working memory capacity are more likely to exhibit more mind wandering during these simple task, but their performance did not suffer.
A limitation of the study is that the article did not thoroughly explain the available working resources. Another limitation is generalization of the findings. The authors stated that their findings can provide more opportunities for other researchers to study the associations of WM and people’s internal world. However, they did not explain how their findings can be applied to real world settings to explain the functions of each cognitive task. The current paper intends to examine ADHD as an evolutionary advantage to our ancestors and how those advantages are reflected in the cognitive strengths of children with ADHD.
The Research paper on Empowering Children’s Cognitive And Emotional Capacity
INTRODUCTION Before examining the topic in depth, I need to briefly recall the characters of the psychological world under study, in order to satisfy the need for a contextual frame. Jean Piaget was born in 1896 in Neuchatel, Switzerland, and died in September 1980 in Geneva. He studied in the Faculty of Science at the University of Neuchatel, where he obtained a Doctorate in Natural Sciences. He ...
Hartmann proposed that ADHD may have served as an evolutionary survival asset to our ancestors during the hunter-gatherer era (Hartmann 2007:2).
He also hypothesized that children may have the disorder because they live in a different social and ecological context. Though his “Hunter vs. Farmer” hypothesis was a controversial topic, there have been various researches that support his claim. More research has shown that the 7R allele is higher in populations that exhibit more migration and interracial marriages. Furthermore, nomadic men who had the 7r allele were less likely to be underweight and encounter short-term threats (Eisenberg et al. 008:173).
Hartmann’s example of a good hunter was associated with the cognitive strengths in children with ADHD. Gifted children with ADHD demonstrated superior fluid reasoning and short-term memory as compared to their normal peers (Wells 2008:3964).
Furthermore, children with ADHD exhibited strengths in task that required them to overcome constraining influences (Abraham et al. 2006:112).
Additionally, children with ADHD were better at areas demanding logical thinking, reasoning, and common sense (Ek et al 2007:760).
Studies also had shown that people with ADHD had higher functioning working memory because they exhibit more levels of mind wandering (Davidson 2012:365).
The findings may suggest our children possess sharper problem solving abilities and better multi-tasking skill. With the research findings that support Hartmann’s hypothesis, there is a high likelihood that ADHD in an evolutionary survival asset and those children with ADHD today do not have a disorder. Instead, they are human beings who possess cognitive abilities that are a disadvantage in a social context that was originally created for “farmers”.
The Research paper on The Use Of Sleephormone1 In Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders
You are being asked to allow your child (who is a minor) to participate in this research study because he or she has a neurodevelopmental disorder. Children with neurological and/or developmental disorders have a higher prevalence for chronic sleep disturbances that are usually far more difficult to treat than those experienced by their ‘normally’ developing peers. Please read the following ...
For example, schooling is compulsory and generally dictates how they should learn, and employs an essentially instructional approach. However, this approach ignores the strengths and weakness of our children and may explain the reason why children with ADHD are struggling in school today. Therefore, our education system should modify its classroom structures so that it can incorporate the strengths of our children with ADHD. By doing this, our society will focus on ADHD as less of a disorder and more of a genetic makeup that gives people different cognitive strengths.
Bibliography Abraham, A. , Windmann, S. , Siefen, R. , Daum, I. , and Gunturkun, O. 2006 Creative thinking in adolescents with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Child Neuropsychology, 12(2), 111-123. Arcos-Burgos M, and Acosta MT. 2007 Tuning major gene variants conditioning human behavior: the anachronism of ADHD. Curr. Opin. Genet, 17(3), 234-238. Canu, W. H. , and Carlson. 2007 Rejection sensitivity and social outcomes of young adult men with ADHD. Journal of Attention Disorders, 10(3), 261-275. CDC 2007State-based Prevalence Data of ADHD Diagnosis.
Retrieved from Center for Disease Control and Prevention Eisenberg D, Campbell B, Gray P, and Sorenson M. 2008 Dopamine receptor genetic polymorphisms and body composition in undernourished pastoralists: An exploration of nutrition indices among nomadic and recently settled Ariaal men of northern Kenya. MC Evolutionary Biology, 8(173).
Ek, U. , Fernell, E. , Westerlund, J. , Holmberg, K. , Olsson, P. , and Gillberg, C. 2007 Cognitive strengths and deficits in schoolchildren with ADHD. Acta Paediatrica, 95(6), 756-761. Faraone SV, and Khan SA. 2006 Candidate gene studies of attention- deficit/hyperactivity disorder.
J Clin Psychiatry, 67(8), 13-20. Levinson, D. , Smallwood, J. , and Davidson, R. 2012 The Persistence of Thought Evidence for a Role of Working Memory in the Maintenance of Task-Unrelated Thinking. Psychological Science, 23(4), 375-380. Thom Hartmann (Presenter).
2007 Thom Hartmann’s Hunter and Farmer Approach to ADD/ADHD. Speech presented at ADHD Education, . Wells, J. 2008 Exploring relative cognitive strengths among rigorously selected private school students with ADHD. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section B: The Sciences and Engineering, 3964.
