Adolescent Changes in Brain and Behavior in Boys and Girls With ADHD
Adolescent Changes in Brain and Behavior in Boys and Girls With ADHD
The purpose of the study is to examine the developmental trajectory of response control in boys and girls with ADHD entering adolescence. The investigators also want to determine the developmental trajectory of brain anatomy and brain connectivity in boys and girls with ADHD entering adolescence.
Children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) are at risk for a host of deleterious outcomes including impaired social relations, academic difficulties, criminality, and comorbid psychopathology (substance use, depression, anxiety). Many of these difficulties emerge and exacerbate during adolescence; therefore, it is crucial to understand the developmental trajectory of ADHD-associated changes in brain and behavior during this sensitive period. Further, there is increasing recognition that sex may be an important moderator of the clinical manifestations of ADHD, with adolescent boys showing more impulsive risk-taking while girls show more emotional dysregulation.
Identification of patterns of brain and behavioral development associated with risk for poor outcome in both boys and girls with ADHD shows the profound public health significance of our research. Furthermore, the investigators are proposing to examine the dimensional construct of response control in children with ADHD from multiple levels of analysis including neural structure and connectivity, behavioral expression, and relation to functional outcomes, with the ultimate goal of identifying bio-behavioral markers of impairment and adjustment in children with ADHD.
Our objectives:
Aim 1: To examine the developmental trajectory of response control in boys and girls with ADHD entering adolescence.
Aim 2: To examine how baseline abnormalities in response control and brain structure and function, as well as development trajectories for these measures, differentially predict functional outcomes in adolescent boys and girls with ADHD.
Aim 3: To examine how intrinsic functional connectivity relates to brain structure, structural connectivity, and response control in adolescent boys and girls with ADHD.
Inclusion Criteria:
Exclusion Criteria: