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Establishing a positive peer climate in the elementary school classroom is an important goal for educators. This pilot study examined if children's liking and disliking of their classroom peers is predicted by teachers' use of practices designed to address child disruptive behaviors that are off-putting to peers, and practices designed to enhance peer inclusivity. Whereas teacher practices to foster good peer relationships are useful for all students, they are particularly important for those with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) symptoms, as these children are often poorly regarded by classmates. Thus, we explored the moderating effect of child ADHD symptom status. Participants were 194 children (grades K-4) in the classrooms of 12 teachers. The teachers were helping our study team revise the Making Socially Accepting Inclusive Classrooms (MOSAIC) program for use in general education classrooms. The MOSAIC program contains a set of teacher strategies to encourage students' increased liking and decreased disliking of one another, which was measured by sociometric ratings. Teachers' use of MOSAIC strategies were observed and self-reported over a school year. Results indicated that teacher practices designed to improve children's classroom behaviors, as well as practices that encouraged peers to be more inclusive, each predicted children receiving better sociometric ratings at the end of the year after accounting for ratings at the beginning of the year. Some practices appeared uniquely efficacious for children with elevated ADHD symptoms, whereas others were useful for all children but had accentuated benefits for typical children. Implications for practitioners are discussed. [This article was published in "School Mental Health" (EJ1253711).]

We examined the extent to which children's skilled understanding and production of appropriate language (verbal ability) may relate to their peer functioning. Participants included two independent samples of children with and without Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD; Study 1, N = 124; Study 2, N = 137) who were administered a standardized intelligence test to generate verbal ability scores. Teacher ratings on the Cooperation and Assertion subscales of the "Social Skills Rating System" (SSRS), teacher estimates of peer acceptance, parent ratings of conflict and disengagement on playdates, and peer sociometric ratings of liking were obtained. In both Study 1 and Study 2, after statistical control of ADHD diagnostic status, disruptive behavior comorbidities, and gender, higher verbal ability was associated with better peer functioning on the teacher-reported SSRS subscales and parent ratings of conflict and disengagement on playdates. In Study 2, interaction effects suggested that the positive association between verbal ability and good peer functioning existed for boys but not for girls. For children with ADHD (but not comparison children), better verbal ability was associated with higher teacher-reported peer acceptance but lower peer sociometric liking. Implications of these findings for conceptualization of peer problems, assessment, and intervention are discussed.

The current study examined competing predictions of the working memory and behavioral inhibition models of ADHD. Behavioral inhibition was measured using a conventional stop-signal task, and central executive, phonological, and visuospatial working memory components (Baddeley 2007) were assessed in 14 children with ADHD and 13 typically developing (TD) children. Bootstrapped mediation analyses revealed that the visuospatial working memory system and central executive both mediated the relationship between group membership (ADHD, TD) and stop-signal task performance. Conversely, stop-signal task performance mediated the relationship between group membership and central executive processes, but was unable to account for the phonological and visuospatial storage/rehearsal deficits consistently found in children with ADHD. Comparison of effect size estimates for both models suggested that working memory deficits may underlie impaired stop-signal task performance in children with ADHD. The current findings therefore challenge existing models of ADHD that describe behavioral inhibition as a core deficit of the disorder.

Social and academic functioning are linked in elementary school, and both are frequently impaired in children with elevated symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). This study evaluated the Making Socially Accepting Inclusive Classrooms (MOSAIC) program, a classroom intervention to support children's social and academic functioning, especially for children at risk for ADHD. Teachers delivered MOSAIC practices to the whole class and applied some strategies more frequently to target children selected for elevated ADHD symptoms and peer impairment. Participants were 34 general education teachers (grades K-5) and 558 children in their classrooms, randomized to MOSAIC or to a typical practice control group for one academic year. In the fall and spring, we assessed (a) peers' sociometric judgments of children, (b) children's self-report of supportive relationships with teachers and peers, and (c) teachers' report of children's social and academic competencies and impairments. Regarding whole class effects, relative to control group children, children in MOSAIC classrooms (target and non-target children) were rated by teachers in spring as having better competencies and lower impairment, after controlling for fall functioning. There were no main effects of MOSAIC on peer sociometrics or child perceptions of supportive relationships. Target status moderated some effects such that, in spring, target children in MOSAIC perceived greater support from their teachers but received poorer sociometrics than did target children in control classrooms. We discuss the difficulty in changing peers' perceptions of children with ADHD symptoms, even in the presence of improvements in other aspects of social and academic functioning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Children with ADHD display higher rates of sleep problems, and both sleep disorders and ADHD have been shown to affect functioning in childhood. The current study examines the frequency and relationship between sleep problems and ADHD, and their impact on quality of life (QoL) and functional impairment. Method: Parents of 192 children with ADHD (M = 10.23 years) completed measures regarding their child's ADHD symptoms (Swanson, Nolan and Pelham [SNAP]), sleep disorders (Pediatric Sleep Questionnaire [PSQ]), QoL (Child Health Illness Profile [CHIP-PE]), and functioning (Weiss Functional Impairment Rating Scale–Parent Report [WFIRS-P]). Results: Common sleep complaints in participants were insomnia, excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS), and variability in sleep schedule. Regression analysis indicated that sleep problems and ADHD symptoms independently predicted lower levels of QoL (Δ R 2 =.12, p <.001) and social functioning (Δ R 2 =.12, p <.001). Conclusion: The results suggest that ADHD may coexist with somnolence and that both conditions have a significant impact on a child's functioning and QoL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Working memory (WM) and behavioral inhibition impairments have garnered significant attention as candidate core features, endophenotypes, and/or associated neurocognitive deficits of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The relationship between ADHD-related WM and inhibition deficits remains relatively unclear, however, with inferences about the constructs’ directional relationship stemming predominantly from correlational research. The current study utilized a dual-task paradigm to experimentally examine the relationship between ADHD-related WM and behavioral inhibition deficits. A total of 31 boys (15 ADHD and 16 typically developing [TD]) aged 8–12 years completed WM (1-back and 2-back), behavioral inhibition (stop-signal task [SST]), and dual-condition (1-back/SST and 2-back/SST) experimental tasks. Children with ADHD exhibited significant, large-magnitude WM deficits for the 1-back condition but were not significantly different from children in the TD group for the 2-back, 1-back/SST, and 2-back/SST conditions. Children with ADHD also exhibited significant inhibition deficits for the SST, 1-back/SST, and 2-back/SST conditions, but the within-group effect was not significant. The findings suggest that ADHD-related stop-signal demands are upstream, or compete for, resources involved in controlled-focused attention and/or other central executive (CE), WM processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The episodic buffer component of working memory was examined in children with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and typically developing peers (TD). Thirty-two children (ADHD = 16, TD = 16) completed three versions of a phonological working memory task that varied with regard to stimulus presentation modality (auditory, visual, or dual auditory and visual), as well as a visuospatial task. Children with ADHD experienced the largest magnitude working memory deficits when phonological stimuli were presented via a unimodal, auditory format. Their performance improved during visual and dual modality conditions but remained significantly below the performance of children in the TD group. In contrast, the TD group did not exhibit performance differences between the auditory- and visual-phonological conditions but recalled significantly more stimuli during the dual-phonological condition. Furthermore, relative to TD children, children with ADHD recalled disproportionately fewer phonological stimuli as set sizes increased, regardless of presentation modality. Finally, an examination of working memory components indicated that the largest magnitude between-group difference was associated with the central executive. Collectively, these findings suggest that ADHD-related working memory deficits reflect a combination of impaired central executive and phonological storage/rehearsal processes, as well as an impaired ability to benefit from bound multimodal information processed by the episodic buffer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Working memory (WM) and behavioral inhibition impairments have garnered significant attention as candidate core features, endophenotypes, and/or associated neurocognitive deficits of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The relationship between ADHD-related WM and inhibition deficits remains relatively unclear, however, with inferences about the constructs' directional relationship stemming predominantly from correlational research. The current study utilized a dual-task paradigm to experimentally examine the relationship between ADHD-related WM and behavioral inhibition deficits. A total of 31 boys (15 ADHD and 16 typically developing [TD]) aged 8-12 years completed WM (1-back and 2-back), behavioral inhibition (stop-signal task [SST]), and dual-condition (1-back/SST and 2-back/SST) experimental tasks. Children with ADHD exhibited significant, large-magnitude WM deficits for the 1-back condition but were not significantly different from children in the TD group for the 2-back, 1-back/SST, and 2-back/SST conditions. Children with ADHD also exhibited significant inhibition deficits for the SST, 1-back/SST, and 2-back/SST conditions, but the within-group effect was not significant. The findings suggest that ADHD-related stop-signal demands are upstream, or compete for, resources involved in controlled-focused attention and/or other central executive (CE), WM processes.