Regulation of emotion in ADHD: can children with ADHD override the natural tendency to approach positive and avoid negative pictures?

Abstract

Studies have demonstrated inefficient use of antecedent-focused emotion regulation strategies in children with ADHD attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). In the current study we tested for the first time if ADHD is also associated with difficulties in response-focused strategies by measuring the ability to override action tendencies induced by emotional information. Performance data on a computer based approach-avoidance paradigm of 28 children with ADHD and 38 typically developing children between 8 and 15 years of age were analyzed comparing a congruent condition in which they were instructed to approach positive and avoid negative pictures and an incongruent condition where they had to override these automatic reactions and approach negative and avoid positive pictures. Children also rated the valence and salience of the pictures. Children with ADHD and typically developing children rated the emotional valence of the pictures appropriately and similarly, while positive pictures were rated as more arousing by children with ADHD. Solid congruency effects were found indicating that the task measured response-focused emotion regulation, however groups did not differ in this respect. Our findings do not support a deficit in emotion regulation in ADHD in terms of the ability to override natural tendencies to approach positive and avoid negative pictures.

Burn! How implicit and explicit attitudes predict early adolescents’ “hot sauce” aggression toward classroom peers

“…This joystick task assumed a link between the evaluation of a person and the speed of one's tendency to bring that person closer (an approach movement indicating a positive evaluation) or move it away (an avoidance movement indicating a negative evaluation). Not only has the theory behind this idea been thoroughly described (Elliot, 1999), but also the fundamental working of the approach-avoidance paradigm has been demonstrated in adults (Chen & Bargh, 1999;Eder & Rothermund, 2008) and youths (Van Cauwenberge, Sonuga-Barke, Hoppenbrouwers, Van Leeuwen, & Wiersema, 2017). Moreover, it has been shown to be practically relevant in studying emotion, addiction, and phobia (Heuer, Rinck, & Becker, 2007;Marsh, Ambady, & Kleck, 2005; as well as youths' reactions to fantasy animals (Huijding et al, 2009), spiders (Klein, Becker, & Rinck, 2011), peers in general (Lansu et al, 2013), and popular and unpopular peers specifically (Lansu et al, 2012).…”