Extracurricular Involvement in Children with ADHD
Brenda V. Alvarez
Mentor: Dr. Carol Whalen
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) affects a significant portion of
today’s youth. Although medication helps alleviate difficult symptoms associated with
ADHD and allows children to function more effectively, problematic moods and
behaviors often remain, which have direct implications for children’s daily lives and
learning opportunities. A developmentally important and relatively unstudied aspect of
ADHD is involvement and performance in age-appropriate extracurricular activities
during childhood. The relationship between activity participation and ADHD was
examined through secondary analysis of data collected from a one-week electronic diary
study of children with ages from 8 to 12 years. Twenty-eight children with ADHD (19
males, 9 females) and 28 comparison age-mates (19 males, 9 females) participated with
their mothers. It was found that children with ADHD were less likely to participate in
extracurricular activities overall than were their comparison peers. In particular, children
with ADHD participated in fewer individual sports and youth groups than did comparison
children. Interestingly, no group differences were found in the children’s ability to
perform these activities (as reported by parents), suggesting that parental time constraints
or children’s peer relations may be affecting participation rates. It is also possible that
methodological differences in the assessment of ability and extracurricular participation
may have contributed to the pattern of findings, given that measures of participation were
more unobtrusive and thus presumably less susceptible to bias. These findings have
implications for understanding and treating ADHD, because extracurricular activities
provide opportunities for learning important social and performance skills.