Background Children with attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) experience greater sleep problems than their peers. Although adolescence is generally a developmental period characterized by insufficient sleep, few studies have used a multi‐informant, multi‐method design, to examine whether sleep differs in adolescents with and without ADHD. Methods Targeted recruitment was used to enroll an approximately equal number of eighth‐grade adolescents (mean age = 13 years) with (n = 162) and without ADHD (n = 140). Adolescents and parents completed global ratings of sleep problems; adolescents, parents, and teachers completed ratings of daytime sleepiness. Adolescents wore actigraphs and completed a daily sleep diary for approximately 2 weeks. Results Adolescents with ADHD were more likely than adolescents without ADHD to obtain insufficient sleep on school days (per diary) and weekends (per diary and actigraphy). Adolescents with ADHD were also more likely to report falling asleep in class and to have stayed up all night at least twice in the previous 2 weeks (14% and 5% reported all‐nighters for ADHD and comparison, respectively). In regression analyses controlling for a number of variables known to impact sleep (e.g. pubertal development, sex, medication use, having an externalizing, anxiety, or depression diagnosis), ADHD remained associated with shorter diary and actigraphy school night sleep duration, adolescent‐ and parent‐reported daytime sleepiness, and parent‐reported difficulties initiating and maintaining sleep and total sleep disturbance. Controlling for other variables, the odds of being classified with clinically elevated parent‐reported sleep disturbance were 6.20 times greater for adolescents with ADHD. Conclusions Findings provide some of the clearest evidence yet that adolescents with ADHD experience more sleep problems and sleepiness than their peers without ADHD. It may be especially important to assess for sleep problems in adolescents with ADHD and to evaluate whether existing sleep interventions are effective, or can be optimized, for use in adolescents with ADHD who also have sleep problems.

Brief school-based interventions implemented by school providers can be effective. This type of service delivery model may facilitate overcoming the oft cited research-to-practice gap. (PsycINFO Database Record

The goal of this study was to use novel approaches that do not require the use of arbitrary cut-points (i.e., latent profile/transition analysis) to evaluate the prevalence and stability of the positive illusory bias (PIB) in young adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Participants were 326 middle-school students diagnosed with ADHD (Mage = 12.26 years, 71% male, 77% Caucasian). The Self-Perception Profile for Children (SPPC) was completed by participants and their parents at baseline and again 12 and 18 months later. Cross-sectional results revealed four subgroups based on SPPC responses. Only a small subset (18.4%) of youth with ADHD exhibited a global PIB, across the behavioral, scholastic, and social domains, with an additional 29% displaying a PIB in the scholastic domain only. Additionally, average parent/adolescent-rated competence within each subgroup was in line with an objective measure of scholastic competence (i.e., grades). When examined longitudinally, only a PIB in the social domain was stable across the 18-month study period and only for half of the sample. These findings suggest that the PIB is not ubiquitous in youth with ADHD, with many young adolescents rating themselves accurately relative to their parents and their grades. Further, when stability across time is considered, the PIB may be specific to social functioning, as opposed to a global, cross-domain phenomenon. Implications for the future measurement of the PIB are discussed.

These results fill an important gap in the literature. Overall, results suggest that rating scales can be used effectively to evaluate ADHD on college campuses as long as both parent and student ratings of childhood symptoms are collected. Importantly, collecting parent ratings protects against possible student malingering to obtain ADHD medications or accommodations. Additional research with larger samples and across multiple universities is needed to establish best practices in the diagnosis of ADHD.

Study Objectives To determine the sociodemographic, behavioral, and clinical risk factors associated with the persistence, remission, and incidence of insomnia symptoms in the transition from childhood to adolescence. Methods The Penn State Child Cohort is a random, population-based sample of 700 children (5-12 years at baseline), of whom 421 were followed up as adolescents (12-23 years at follow-up). Subjects underwent polysomnography, clinical history, physical exam, and parent- and self-reported scales at baseline and follow-up. Insomnia symptoms were defined as a parent- or self-report of difficulty falling and/or staying asleep. Results The 421 subjects with baseline (Mage=8.8y) and follow-up (Mage=17y) data were 53.9% male and 21.9% racial/ethnic minorities. The persistence of childhood insomnia symptoms was 56% (95%CI=46.5-65.4), with only 30.3% (95%CI=21.5-39.0) fully remitting. The incidence of adolescent insomnia symptoms was 31.1% (95%CI=25.9-36.3). Female sex, racial/ethnic minority and low socioeconomic status as well as psychiatric/behavioral or neurological disorders, obesity, smoking, and evening chronotype were associated with a higher persistence or incidence of insomnia symptoms. Conclusions Childhood insomnia symptoms are highly persistent, with full remission occurring in only a third of children in the transition to adolescence. Sex-, racial/ethnic- and socioeconomic-related disparities in insomnia occur as early as childhood, while different mental/physical health and lifestyle/circadian risk factors play a key role in the chronicity of childhood insomnia symptoms vs. their incidence in adolescence. Childhood insomnia symptoms should not be expected to developmentally remit and should become a focus of integrated pediatric/behavioral health strategies.