title: Controlling attention to gaze and arrows in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
abstract: The aim of this research was to assess implicit processing of social and non-social distracting cues in children with ADHD. Young people with ADHD and matched controls were asked to classify target words (LEFT/RIGHT) which were accompanied by a distracter eye-gaze or arrow. Typically developing participants showed evidence of interference effects from both eye-gaze and arrow distracters. In contrast, the ADHD group showed evidence of interference effects from arrow but failed to show interference from eye-gaze. This absence of interference effects from eye-gaze observed in the participants with ADHD may reflect an attentional impairment in attending to socially relevant information.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology and Physiology of Behaviour, Mind, Brain, and Behavior Research Center, University of Granada, Granada, Spain; Dipartimento di Psicologia, "Sapienza" Università di Roma, Italy. Electronic address: andrea.marotta@uniroma1.it.
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Marotta
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuroscience, Child Neurology and Psychiatry Unit, 'Tor Vergata' University of Rome, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Augusto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pasini
authors.affiliation: AIDAI ONLUS Regione Lazio, Italy.
authors.forename: Erica
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Menotti
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Psicologia, "Sapienza" Università di Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Alessia
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pasquini
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Psicologia, "Sapienza" Università di Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Maria Bernarda
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Pitzianti
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Psicologia, "Sapienza" Università di Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Casagrande
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000523:psychology*; D002648:Child; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods*; D011897:Random Allocation; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology
keywords: ADHD; Arrow; Cognitive control; Eye-gaze; Social attention