ADHD and Anxiety Symptoms: Does Construct or Assessment Type Matter More?

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Neuroscience
• Clinical Research

Background:

• Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental disorder.
• Anxiety disorders frequently co-occur with ADHD, complicating diagnosis and treatment.
• Objective measures like the Continuous Performance Test (CPT) are used to assess attention and impulsivity in ADHD evaluations.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the relationship between self-reported ADHD symptoms, self-reported anxiety, and objective performance on the CPT.
• To determine if CPT performance can predict self-reported ADHD symptoms when accounting for anxiety.

Main Methods:

• 128 postsecondary students evaluated for ADHD completed self-report measures (Conners Adult ADHD Rating Scale, Behavior Assessment Scale for Children) and two types of CPTs.
• Multiple regression analyses were employed to examine predictive relationships.

Main Results:

• Self-reported anxiety significantly predicted self-reported ADHD symptoms.
• Continuous Performance Test (CPT) performance did not significantly predict self-reported ADHD symptoms.
• These findings were consistent across different CPT versions and student subsamples.

Conclusions:

• Self-reported anxiety and ADHD symptoms are closely linked in this student population.
• CPT performance does not appear to be a reliable indicator of self-reported ADHD symptoms or anxiety in this context.
• Clinical practice may benefit from considering the strong association between anxiety and ADHD symptom reporting, while CPT utility warrants further investigation.