Abstract
Performance on executive function (EF) tasks is only modestly predictive of a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), despite the common assumption that EF deficits are ubiquitous to the disorder. The current study sought to determine whether ex-Gaussian parameters of simple reaction time are better able to discriminate between children and adults with and without ADHD, compared with traditional measures of inhibitory control. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analyses and the area under the curve (AUC) were used to examine the ability of performance on two commonly used tasks of inhibitory control (i.e. stop signal reaction time (SSRT) and go-no-go tasks) to predict ADHD status in preschool (N = 108), middle childhood (N = 309), and young adulthood (N = 133). Across all samples, SSRT, go-no-go percentage of failed inhibits, and standard deviation of reaction (SDRT) time to "go" trials, all successfully discriminated between individuals with and without ADHD. Ex-Gaussian decomposition of the RT distribution indicated that both larger tau and larger sigma drove findings for SDRT. Contrary to predictions, traditional measures of inhibitory control were equal if not better predictors of ADHD status than ex-Gaussian parameters. Findings support ongoing work to quantify the separate contributions of cognitive subprocesses that drive task performance, which in turn is critical to developing and improving process-based approaches in clinical assessment.
Highlights
Performance on executive function (EF) tasks is only modestly predictive of a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), despite the common assumption that EF deficits are ubiquitous to the disorder
Much of the modern literature that has repeatedly documented the presence of executive function (EF) deficits in children and adults with ADHD has done so by demonstrating high error rates and slower/more variable response times (RT) on tasks commonly used to index executive control
Using Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves and the area under the curve (AUC), the current study evaluates the degree to which ex-Gaussian parameters of reaction time might better discriminate between children and young adults with and without ADHD, compared with traditional methods of indexing cognition
Summary
Performance on executive function (EF) tasks is only modestly predictive of a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), despite the common assumption that EF deficits are ubiquitous to the disorder. The current study sought to determine whether ex-Gaussian parameters of simple reaction time are better able to discriminate between children and adults with and without ADHD, compared with traditional measures of inhibitory control. Methods: Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analyses and the area under the curve (AUC) were used to examine the ability of performance on two commonly used tasks of inhibitory control (i.e. stop signal reaction time (SSRT) and go-no-go tasks) to predict ADHD status in preschool (N = 108), middle childhood (N = 309), and young adulthood (N = 133). Traditional measures of inhibitory control were equal if not better predictors of ADHD status than ex-Gaussian parameters. Mean performance on reaction time and traditional paper-and-pencil neuropsychological tasks are only weakly predictive of diagnostic status in children or adults. Genuine cognitive heterogeneity within the broad phenotype of ADHD likely exists (Fair, Bathula, Nikolas, & Nigg, 2012; Wahlstedt, Thorell, & Bohlin, 2009), it may be that the tendency to rely on indices of central tendency (e.g. mean, standard deviation, median) does not provide the best descriptors of performance and subsequently prevents the identification of what could be more
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