Effect of additional auditory and visual stimuli on continuous performance test (noise-generated CPT) in AD/HD children – usefulness of noise-generated CPT

While data from behavioral, neuropsychological, and brain studies suggested that Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is related to a developmental lag that reduces with age, other studies have proposed that ADHD represents a deviant brain function. The present study used a cross-sectional approach to examine whether ADHD children show a developmental delay in cognitive performance measured by continuous performance test (CPT). We thus, compared six age groups of ADHD children (N = 559) and their unaffected peers (N = 365), aged 6–11, in four parameters of MOXO-CPT performance: Attention, Timing, Hyperactivity and Impulsivity. Results have shown that despite improvement in CPT performance with age, ADHD children continued to demonstrate impaired performance as compared to controls. In most parameters, CPT performance of ADHD children matched that of 1–3 years younger normal controls, with a delay most prominent in older children. However, in the Hyperactivity parameter, ADHD children's performance resembled that of much younger healthy children, with almost no evidence for a developmental catch up. This study suggests that while some cognitive functions develop slower but normally, other functions (e.g., inhibitory control) show a different trajectory.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Maturational delay in ADHD: evidence from CPT

Berger

Slobodin

Aboud

et al. 2013

“…Further, while some studies have used neutral stimuli (neutral tone/letter) as distractors (Gordon and Mettelman, 1987;Uno et al, 2006;van Mourik et al, 2007), the MOXO-CPT incorporated ecologically valid stimuli that are typically found in the child's or adolescent's everyday environment. Because patients with ADHD have more difficulties in filtering meaningful distractors than neutral ones (Blakeman, 2000;López-Martín et al, 2013), it is possible that this feature of the test further contributed to its high distractibility load.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender Differences in Objective and Subjective Measures of ADHD Among Clinic-Referred Children

Slobodin

Davidovitch

2019

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), one of the most prevalent childhood disorders today, is generally more likely to be diagnosed and treated in boys than in girls. However, gender differences in ADHD are currently poorly understood, partly because previous research included only a limited proportion of girls and relied mainly on subjective measures of ADHD, which are highly vulnerable to reporter's bias. To further examine gender differences in ADHD and to address some of the shortcomings of previous studies, this study examined gender differences in subjective and objective measures of ADHD among clinic-referred children with ADHD. Participants were 204 children aged 6-17 years-old with ADHD (129 boys, 75 girls). A retrospective analysis was conducted using records of a clinical database. Obtained data included parent and teacher forms of the Conners ADHD rating scales, Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), Teacher's Report Form (TRF), and child's continuous performance test (CPT) scores. Results showed that according to parents' and teachers' reports of ADHD-related symptoms (Conners ADHD rating scales), girls had more inattention problems than boys, but no differences were identified in the level of hyperactivity and impulsivity symptoms. CPT data, however, revealed higher impulsivity among boys. We did not find gender differences in the level of distractibility during CPT performance. Specifically, the effects of distractors type (visual environmental stimuli, auditory stimuli, or a combination of them) and distractors load (one or two distracting stimuli at a time) on CPT performance did not differ between boys and girls with ADHD. These findings suggest that gender effects on ADHD symptoms may differ between subjective and objective measures. Understanding gender differences in ADHD may lead to improved identification of girls with the disorder, helping to reduce the gender gap in diagnosis and treatment.

“…Recently, Uno et al ( 2006 ) developed a noise-generated CPT, which included neutral, geometric target/non-target stimuli and auditory/visual distractors (tone or irrelevant letter). This study found that while auditory noise strongly reduced impulsive and inattentive behaviors in ADHD relatively to non-ADHD children, visual distractors decreased the number of omission errors in ADHD children but increased it in non-ADHD children.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using environmental distractors in the diagnosis of ADHD

Cassuto

Ben-Simon

Berger

2013

This study examined the effect of the incorporation of environmental distractors in computerized continuous performance test (CPT) on the ability of the test in distinguishing ADHD from non-ADHD children. It was hypothesized that children with ADHD would display more distractibility than controls while performing CPT as measured by omission errors in the presence of pure visual, pure auditory, and a combination of visual and auditory distracting stimuli. Participants were 663 children aged 7–12 years, of them 345 diagnosed with ADHD and 318 without ADHD. Results showed that ADHD children demonstrated more omission errors than their healthy peers in all CPT conditions (no distractors, pure visual or auditory distractors and combined distractors). However, ADHD and non-ADHD children differed in their reaction to distracting stimuli; while all types of distracting stimuli increased the rate of omission errors in ADHD children, only combined visual and auditory distractors increased it in non-ADHD children. Given the low ecological validity of many CPT, these findings suggest that incorporating distractors in CPT improves the ability to distinguish ADHD from non-ADHD children.