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Covert visual attention in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: Evidence for developmental immaturity?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 March 2009

Deborah A. Pearson,
Laura S. Yaffee,
Katherine A. Loveland and
Amy M. Norton
Deborah A. Pearson*
Affiliation:
Center for Human Development Research, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Texas Medical School at Houston
Laura S. Yaffee
Affiliation:
Center for Human Development Research, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Texas Medical School at Houston
Katherine A. Loveland
Affiliation:
Center for Human Development Research, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Texas Medical School at Houston
Amy M. Norton
Affiliation:
Center for Human Development Research, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Texas Medical School at Houston
*
Deborah A. Pearson, Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, University of Texas Medical School, 1300 Moursund St., Houston, TX 77030-3497.
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Abstract

Shifts in covert visual attention were compared in children with and without Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) to determine if children with ADHD have developmental immaturities in covert attention, relative to their non-ADHD peers. Children were told to orient attention to a central fixation point and were then cued, by both central and peripheral cues, to direct their attention to either the left or right peripheral fields. Following variable time intervals, the target appeared and reaction times and errors were recorded. Although performance of all subjects showed faciliation when attention was directed by valid cues and inhibition when attention was directed by invalid cues, the performance of children with ADHD was far more disrupted when their attention was misled by invalid cues, especially at longer intervals. This inconsistency was reflected in significantly higher error rates in the ADHD group. They also showed a pattern of attentional “waxing and waning” in performance over longer time intervals that has been previously found in auditory attention switching over time within trials in children with ADHD. Overall, results are inconsistent with developmentally immature covert attention skills in ADHD. Findings are discussed in terms of the concept of global “developmental immaturity” in the attention skills of children with ADHD.

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Articles
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Development and Psychopathology , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , Spring 1995, pp. 351 - 367
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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