Is there a connection between ADD/ADHD and being gifted and talented?

Do you mean as classified by the public school system? Probably. ADD'ers as a whole tend to have higher IQ's. There is a thread on this somewhere in the forum.

I'd be interested in reading the thread on this. Do you know where I might look? I have 3 children, one is in school and was tested last year for the GT program and qualified.....he also is adhd and an Aspie. I have two younger children that I'm now wondering if they're following suit (one of these 2 has been also dx with ADHD and Aspergers).

Try searching, Im not sure how to find it, but its a poll somewhere.

Is there a connection between ADD/ADHD and being gifted and talented?

I'd say, in my experiences, yes.....
Many of those I know of are very bright &/or very talented. I find that many of the musicians I play with (especially the better ones) are probably undiagnosed, I & others in my family that are ADD were always good & easily so, in school, etc.

I don't know.

Neuroscience has yet to decide what's wrong with me. We know I have brain damage and seizure disorder for sure. But some parts of my memory/cognitive functioning problems are mysterious, and we've been trying to solve that puzzle for quite some time.

So I was recently put on ADD meds--they've tried everything else to see how it will affect my brain and dendrites and see if it will help--and though they're not sure I've actually got ADD, I did have some symptoms of it as a child, and do have trouble concentrating, not getting distracted, and paying attention.

So we're giving this ADD thing a shot.

Now, mind you, like I said, I sort of seemed like I might have ADD along with my other stuff when I was a kid. Maybe it was ADHD, and I grew out of the "H".;)

I had trouble with certain subjects that require different areas of the brain to work in a technical manner--namely, math.

However, I was in the Gifted and Talented Education program throughout school, won awards for writing and art and stuff. So somewhat ironically, I was concurrently in tutorial remedial studies for math, yet spent four hours a day in GATE classes.

So hypothetically, if I had/have ADD comorbidly with my other brain problems, then ADD and Gifted & Talented programs might, in fact, have a connection in some sort of way.

Food for thought, though off the subject: I've also read a book by Kay Redfield Jamison, an amazing author who's a psychiatrist with Bipolar disorder, connecting Bipolarism to high creativity and (positively, not negatively) abstract thinking. Interesting, no?

Chrys

Do you mean as classified by the public school system? Probably. ADD'ers as a whole tend to have higher IQ's. There is a thread on this somewhere in the forum.
Yeah, when my doc first threw this ADD thing at me on Tuesday, he said something about (what he called) my "exceptional" intelligence being concurrent with other patients he has who have ADD.

Who knows?

Chrys

I don't really know of a study that proves this for certain, but I suspect it may be true. Others have already basically stated my reasons for believing this, but I am curious if there is an actual study out there on this. Maybe I shall ask my psychiatrist or therapist sometime. :)

I've wondered about the connection too. I was an exceptional student and musician once I got past elementary school (pretty average up until then), but the areas were very specific. On my GED after college I was in the upper 5 percent in my field -- in math however I hovered around the 30th percentile. One of my counseling professors said that in his experience counselors were almost congenitally unable to do paperwork -- does that mean that lots of counselors tend toward ADD:eek: -- makes you think!:p

Scattered

I've wondered about this myself. To prove that there's a relationship between ADD and "giftedness", how would you eliminate self-selection from the data? The primary complaint I've always had is that I feel like an underachiever. I think it's possible that of all the people with ADD, the bright ones are much more likely to:

* recognize that they could do more
* research what might be wrong, and
* seek out appropriate treatment

What's more, I think that people who are bright get more benefit of the doubt from society. I know that I was allowed to slide a LOT in high school because I was "gifted". There had to be an excuse for my laziness. A student who's not "gifted" might just get labeled "lazy" instead. Of course that was 15 years ago. I'm not sure my experience is still relevant.

Not that there is no link between ADD and intelligence -- heck, I have ADD and I think I'm brilliant! -- but it's always been something I've wondered about.

Interesting theory. I wonder how one would design an experiment to test it.

knitting junkie:

it sounds like maybe you had a learning disability in school. I've read when one exels greatly in many areas but has a deficit in a certain area(in your case math) than it should be looked into as a learning disability in math. I've also read that there can be a gifted child with a learning disability. I'm looking into this more because I think my middle child is this way. He's been dx with adhd, and Aspergers and has been tested as a 5year old (which is still young to get a genuine score on a standardized test..especially with adhd) and his IQ score was in the superior range. He just seems different, really out there sometimes, in his world....not like a little genuis....more like he'l living is his own cartoon world and you think he's not getting anything or learning anything, then he'll pop out with ... "I can count to 100" and does it with no mistakes! He's in pre-k in the early childhood program for children with special needs in the local public school. He'll say really off the wall stuff sometimes too like the other day I heard him tell his dad "Did you know people have to toot to get the gas out?" I just busted out laughing! Anyway I'm jsut curious on how all of these "disorders" tie into being gifted & talented according to the schools.

Interesting thread. I have searched for evidence to back up this theory, and none "appears to exist". I have asked a psychiatrist this same question, and he adamantly stated that ppl with ADHD are as broadly spaced in IQ quotient as the general populus.

This begs the question, how many make great successes of their lives even if they have the gifted/talent/high IQ?

We with ADHD are not remembered for following through, so I am glad my diagnosis was a late one. I forced myself to carry through with my gift and succeed.

How many talented ADD'ers just waste their gifts? I am aware that many do not, but I question what the ratio is.

I've barely met a handful of people in my life who truly challanged me intellectually with their thinking, and people have always told me I'm really smart.

Unfortunately, at the same time I don't have sense enough to come in out of the rain.

So, I'm not sure which side of the scale I belong on, LOL!

I was diagnosed as being gifted when I was around 7 years old...and I didn't find out I had ADD until last summer...now I'm 23. I think that many people may think that gifted children have ADD is because they tend to show some of the same symptoms...like inattention especially. Gifted kids get bored really easily if they don't have something to keep them challenged which is a big thing in ADDers. They are often in their own world...

i dont know if there is. but i have add and am doing exceptionally well. i dont take medication and am totally adhd everyday. i go home and try to do my homework(senior) but never finish. i go to school and don't pay attention and i manage straight As and a salutatorian status. in a way not knowing anything that is going on makes me more independent, and thus making me think more creatively as to how I approach things.

I would like to see a test on this myself.My grandmother was said to have IQ of 180, and taught calculaus to college students at the age of 19, but would ware nothing but red white and blue, so everything matches, She also died, of parkinsons. Did nothing but build and solve puzzles, by herself, disassociating herself with everyone else at the rest home she ended up at. She didn't have many freinds and didn't care too because she felt they were beneath her intuallectally and boring. She couldn't be bothered with the "crap" in life that everyone else seemed so enthralled with. I think she saw the big picture, but knew what she saw was before her time and people just would get it... So she kept it for herself, I really wish I could have know her more, and on a grown up level. She oviously need that stimulation though. Thank god for puzzles. My mother to me is also very smart, although she has narcolepsy, same dopamine level problem going on here....So Yes I also think out side the box and feel I am of better help if in a fix then most people. I stay calm and see things differently then others and come up with answers others never thought about. or just didn't know how to apply the answer. Could the fact that they are just "happy" with the amout and parts of the brain they use, basically Mentally satisfied, because their dopamine comes so much easier and naturally, they don't need the extra knowledge. I don't know if you are following me here, cuz I'm not sure how to get it out... Maybe our thirst for knowledge and Puzzles...per sa... goes to such great extents and digs deeper in parts of our brains then others do because its our natural way of keeping dopamine coming... I also think you never gain without losing...There is always a balance in nature. You have to have your fly by nites that don't care about anything, and you have to have your thinkers, the warriors... That's what I think we may have been long long ago... You had to have that group of people that went out into the darkness to overcome the wilderness and keep the rest of the race. happy and cared for. But don't expect this group to come out of the wilderness, tame... Because they aren't. They have no manners, they have no social skills, they have know basic knowledge of the "easy" stuff. Because they weren't supposed to. they were designed for another purpous, only 1000s of yrs later. that purpous ceassed to exsist, and now they don't know what to do with their SMART selves... hmmmm

Juliette:

It's quite possible...some doctor said something to my parents at some point about the part of my brain that's damaged being strongly related to mathematical calculations. Don't know why or if it's true. But I said something about it to the neuropsych I go to now, and he understood fully what the doctor must have been trying to say. Apparently the damaged area is the most concentrated area that a human brain sparks up and uses when trying to do math. Don't really know how that works.

Couldn't help you with the kiddo...but I do agree that one can be "disabled" and "exceptional" at the same time, just in different areas of life/learning. I'm supposedly a case like that, and I would guess your son is as well. Doubt we have the same root causes to our problems, he and I, but he sounds like he might be like me--have some problems and have some really good things at the same time.

Chrys