Dorsolateral prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortex volumetric abnormalities in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder identified by magnetic resonance imaging.
OBJECTIVE
Gray and white matter volume deficits have been reported in a number of studies of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); however, there is a paucity of structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies of adults with ADHD. This structural MRI study used an a priori region of interest approach.


METHODS
Twenty-four adults with DSM-IV ADHD and 18 healthy controls comparable on age, socioeconomic status, sex, handedness, education, IQ, and achievement test performance had an MRI on a 1.5T Siemens scanner. Cortical and sub-cortical gray and white matter were segmented. Image parcellation divided the neocortex into 48 gyral-based units per hemisphere. Based on a priori hypotheses we focused on prefrontal, anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and overall gray matter volumes. General linear analyses of the volumes of brain regions, adjusting for age, sex, and total cerebral volumes, were used to compare groups.


RESULTS
Relative to controls, ADHD adults had significantly smaller overall cortical gray matter, prefrontal and ACC volumes.


CONCLUSIONS
Adults with ADHD have volume differences in brain regions in areas involved in attention and executive control. These data, largely consistent with studies of children, support the idea that adults with ADHD have a valid disorder with persistent biological features.
Seidman
Larry J
LJ
Harvard Medical School, Department of Psychiatry, Center for Morphometric Analysis, Massachusetts General Hospital, Fruit Street, Boston, MA 02114, USA. lseidman@bidmc.harvard.edu
Valera
Eve M
EM
Makris
Nikos
N
Monuteaux
Michael C
MC
Boriel
Denise L
DL
Kelkar
Kalika
K
Kennedy
David N
DN
Caviness
Verne S
VS
Bush
George
G
Aleardi
Meg
M
Faraone
Stephen V
SV
Biederman
Joseph
J
D000328:Adult; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000473:pathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000002:abnormalities*; D006801:Humans; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional / Q000379:methods; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000002:abnormalities*