Inhibitory control of proactive interference in adults with ADHD.
OBJECTIVE
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is associated with poor inhibition of prepotent responses and deficits in distractor inhibition, but relatively few studies have addressed inhibitory control of proactive interference (PI) in individuals with ADHD. Thus, the goal of the present study was to evaluate resistance to spatial and verbal PI in adults with ADHD.


METHODS
Adults with ADHD (n = 32) and adults without ADHD (n = 32) performed a spatial inhibition of return (IOR) task and a semantic IOR task.


RESULTS
Adults with and without ADHD showed effective spatial IOR. On the semantic IOR task, adults without ADHD showed semantic inhibition, whereas adults with ADHD showed semantic facilitation (positive priming) instead.


CONCLUSIONS
Adults with ADHD may have domain-specific deficits in resistance to proactive interference. Research has theoretical and clinical implications for adults with ADHD.
White
Holly A
HA
Department of Psychology, University of Memphis, TN 38152, USA. hawhite@memphis.edu
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D003118:Color Perception; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011334:Proactive Inhibition; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics