Anxiety and ADHD
Self-Doubt & Executive Attention
• Anxiety is a response to prolonged, unpredictable threats encompassing physiological, emotional, and cognitive changes.
• Self-doubt (am I good enough? do I have the answer to solve this problem?) is uncertainty about one’s competence along with a strong preoccupation with failing in the future.
• When people cannot discredit their self-doubt, anxiety rises.
We Must Proactively Manage Self-doubt
Why? Because anxiety causes threat-response (fight, flight, freeze) and impacts our cognitive functions, specifically impairing our executive attention (ability to control cognitions, emotions, and behaviors; regulate responses, particularly in conflict situations; of limited capacity; attentional resource; goal-directed; impulse control center; located in prefrontal cortex). When threat-response is triggered (located in amygdala), our executive attention becomes easily distracted, concentration is impaired, and working memory is compromised.
Anxiety & ADHD
Anxiety can significantly impact how someone with ADHD manages their condition.
• 50% of adults with ADHD also have an anxiety disorder
• 30% of children with ADHD experience anxiety
ADHD usually begins during childhood with symptoms such as: a short attention span, fidgeting, hyperactivity, impulsivity, restlessness.
Anxiety disorder are long-lasting or all the time feelings of nervousness, fear, and worry; may have difficulty identifying and controlling specific fears and worries; feelings tend to be out of proportion to the situation, and can interfere with people’s daily lives and relationships with others; many types of anxiety disorders, including generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), panic disorder, social anxiety disorder.
• ADHD is not an anxiety disorder
• Anxiety can occur independently of ADHD; and anxiety can be as a result of living with ADHD
If a person with ADHD misses a work deadline or forgets to study for an exam, they can become stressed and worried. Even the fear of forgetting to do such important tasks may cause a person with ADHD anxiety. If these feelings continue, which they do for many people with ADHD, it can lead to an anxiety disorder.
• Medications used to treat ADHD, especially stimulant medications such as amphetamines, can cause symptoms of anxiety
• Genetics may play a role in both
Common to Both
• Difficulty socializing, fidgeting, inattentiveness, working slowly or failing to complete work on time.
• In children/adolescents, anxiety in children with ADHD can include: being irritable or argumentative, causing trouble in class, playing video games or watching TV most of the time, telling lies about schoolwork or other responsibilities that haven’t been completed, withdrawing from people
Differences
• Anxiety is primarily a disorder of nervousness, worry, and fear, while ADHD is characterized by a lack of attention and focus
• People with anxiety can also display compulsive or perfectionist behaviors, which aren’t typically seen in those with ADHD
• Someone with an anxiety disorder will find it difficult to concentrate during certain situations that cause them to feel anxious; however, someone with ADHD will find it difficult to concentrate most or all of the time
