Brief report: The impact of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms on academic performance in an adolescent community sample.

Less is understood about the relationship between ADHD symptoms and academic performance in adolescents than the relationship in younger children. As such, the aim of the present study was to investigate the prospective relationship between ADHD symptoms and academic performance in a community adolescent sample. Three hundred and twenty-four participants, aged 15 and 16, in their final year of compulsory education, completed measures of ADHD, anxiety, depression, and motivation, and a test of general cognitive ability.

Assessing expressed emotion in mothers of children with autism: the Autism-Specific Five Minute Speech Sample.

Background: Expressed emotion (EE) is a measure of family emotional climate found to be predictive of symptom levels in a range of psychiatric, medical, and developmental disorders, including autism.

Method: Employing data from 104 mothers of children with autism, this study examines the Autism-Specific Five Minute Speech Sample (AFMSS), a modified EE coding system based on the widely used Five Minute Speech Sample (Magana et al., 1986).

Do maternal attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms exacerbate or ameliorate the negative effect of child attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms on parenting?

The impact of similarity in parent and child characteristics on the quality of parenting is underresearched. The current study examined the interaction between mother and child attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms on parenting. Two hypotheses were tested: the similarity-fit hypothesis, which predicted that parent and child similarity will improve parenting, and the similarity-misfit hypothesis, which predicted the opposite.

Mothers' expressed emotion toward their school-aged sons. Associations with child and maternal symptoms of psychopathology.

Introduction: Evidence suggests that mothers are negative and critical when talking about their children with behaviour problems. However the association with specific types of behaviour problems and the influence of both child and adult psychopathology on these relationships require further clarification.

Methods: Speech samples were gathered from mothers of 100 school-aged boys and coded using standard Expressed Emotion (EE) categories.

Parenting intervention in Sure Start services for children at risk of developing conduct disorder: pragmatic randomised controlled trial.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of a parenting programme as a preventive intervention with parents of preschool children considered to be at risk of developing conduct disorder.

Design: Pragmatic randomised controlled trial using a block design with allocation by area.

Setting: Eleven Sure Start areas in north and mid-Wales.

Maternal distress and expressed emotion: cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships with behavior problems of children with intellectual disabilities.

Mothers of children with intellectual disability were assessed at two time points, 2 years apart (n = 75 at Time 1, n = 56 at Time 2). Data were gathered on maternal distress, mental health, expressed emotion, and the child's internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Consistent with previous research with families of children who have intellectual disability, maternal distress and children's behavior problems entered into a bidirectional relationship over time.

Symptoms of ADHD and their correlates in children with intellectual disabilities.

Existing research suggests that children with intellectual disabilities are at increased risk for ADHD, and that the symptoms of the disorder might successfully be treated with stimulant drugs. However, there has been little exploration of ADHD symptoms and their correlates in children with intellectual disabilities. Analyses of three samples of children with intellectual disabilities are presented (total N=338).

Spirituality and well-being in frail and nonfrail older adults.

Previous studies have identified that spiritual beliefs contribute to psychological well-being (PWB) in older people, but limited research has considered the effects of spirituality on PWB when physical health deteriorates and people become frail. We recruited 233 British participants from warden-controlled retirement housing to complete interviewer-administered questionnaires. Results showed that, after we controlled for marital status, age, education, other health problems, and gender, degree of frailty had a negative effect on PWB.

The influence of children's self-report trait anxiety and depression on visual search for emotional faces.

Background: This study presents two experiments that investigated the relationship between 7- and 10-year-olds' levels of self-report trait anxiety and depression and their visual search for threatening (angry faces) and non-threatening (happy and neutral faces) stimuli.

Method: In both experiments a visual search paradigm was used to measure participants' reaction times to detect the presence or absence of angry, happy or neutral schematic faces (Experiment 1) or cartoon drawings (Experiment 2). On target present trials, a target face was displayed alongside three, five or seven distractor items.

Are planning, working memory, and inhibition associated with individual differences in preschool ADHD symptoms?

The association between executive function (EF; planning, working memory, and inhibition) and individual differences in symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) was explored in a sample of preschool children. One hundred sixty children (between the ages of 3 years, 0 months and 5 years, 6 months), selected so as to oversample high ADHD scorers, performed 3 tasks previously shown to measure planning (Tower of London), working memory (Noisy Book) and inhibition ("Puppet Says..