Stepping over dollars to pick up pennies: What works for optimal cognitive functioning

Hot news out of Israel (Bar Ilan University) and Los Angeles (UCLA): There’s a way to increase cognitive functioning among children with ADHD that is FREE and leads to BIGGER change than other non-chemical interventions.

What is this magic they speak of? Exercise.

Researchers searched through studies published between 1980 and 2017 on various non-pharmacological interventions for cognitive functions among children with ADHD and narrowed these down to the most trustworthy studies. One of the requirements the researchers had was that the study included an objective measure of cognitive functions.

They examined the effects of several non-pharmacological interventions–neurofeedback, cognitive-behavioral therapy, cognitive training, and physical exercises (aerobic)–and found all the interventions associated with desired changes. Physical exercise, however, rose to the top with the largest average effect size. Granted 18 studies across four interventions is small; however, the results are consistent with tons of research on the association between exercise and optimal physical, emotional and cognitive functioning.

The study.

So this is what my title is about…we often step over the dollars of optimal functioning and well-being to pick up pennies. The dollars are regular physical exercise (aerobic), enough sleep, and healthy eating. The pennies are the skills, strategies, games we may play with ourselves (fun or otherwise) that we often seek instead. The pennies matter; I’m just suggesting you pick up the dollars first.

My two cents. Or dollars. : )

October 22, 2019 0

Understanding ADHD

Per Russell Barkley (RB), ADHD guru (i.e., scholar and scientist):

ADHD is a disorder of self-regulation that can also be described as a “disorder of age-inappropriate behavior” that looks like inattention and lack of inhibition.

Though I want to clarify that the inattention depends on what you are doing; another guru of ADHD, Thomas Brown, says the “central mystery” of ADHD is that those with it can pay attention to some things and seem incapable of paying attention to other things.

But back to RB and ADHD as a disorder of self-regulation.

RB defines self-regulation as “self-directed action intended to alter subsequent behavior so as to change the probability of a future event or consequence” (to improve your longer-term welfare).

For example, say you have a problem with money and keep getting into debt by living off credit. You want to pay off your debt (self-directed action) to be able to cancel your credit card and limit spending (subsequent behavior) to reduce the chance you’ll get into debt again (change the probability of a future event).

Where does ADHD fit? With ADHD one has the intention to alter behavior (e.g, limit spending) to change the future (e.g., live debt-free) but struggles with the self-directed action (e.g., paying off debt) required for this.

Barkley says it’s a disorder where knowledge fails to guide performance. You know what to do but struggle to do it.

WHY?

RB highlights that ADHD brains show prefrontal cortical network differences (these networks are responsible for Executive Functioning and self-regulation is the core of Executive Functioning). Here is where the differences exist and what comes into play:

Frontal-striatal circuit, the “what” network (what we think influences what we do) Here lives…
- Freedom from distraction
- Working memory
- Organization and planning
Frontal-cerebellar circuit, the “when” network (timing of thought, behavior)
- With ADHD, there’s “time blindness,” and
- A “myopia to the future”
Frontal-limbic circuit, the “why” network. Here lives…
- The decision-maker of the brain (if you have multiple goals, which do you pursue? this circuit, as RB puts it, “makes the final call”)
- Motivation
- Emotional control or dyscontrol

These network differences show up as self-regulation differences that encompass

Self-directed action, Self-awareness, Self-motivation, Self-directed attention, Self-restraint, Self-directed sensing, Self-directed emotions, and Self-directed play.

WHAT TO DO?

Outsource these brain functions.

RB calls this externalizing the brain functions where there are deficits. For example, he says, use “artificial prosthetic cues to substitute for working memory deficits.”

Ideally, this is what ADHD coaches will help you do (for more on this, see Does ADHD Coaching Work?)

Here are some pointers for externalization:

Per RB, the externalization of brain functions is needed at the point of performance and within your natural setting (e.g., if you struggle to write a report at work, you need external factors to guide your attention at work at the time you need to write); and
To externalize, change your environment (think planners, alarms, points, signs).

Replenish your self-regulation (think self-control) resource pool. It’s depleted by simple use as well as stress, drug abuse, illness. Replenish through

Rewards, positive emotions
Positive self-talk
10 minute breaks between tasks requiring self-control
3 minutes of relaxation or meditation
Glucose ingestion (Gatorade, lemonade, sugar water) while working on tasks requiring self-control
Daily physical exercise

Also, break lengthy or complicated tasks down. One of my favorite reminders of this, though I really like elephants, is, “How do you eat an elephant?”

Answer: one bite at a time.

RB adds that accommodations or scaffolding and the compassion and willingness of others to make accommodations are “vital” to your self-regulation effectiveness.

Sources: Two talks by Russell Barkley on ADHD, one from 2013 entitled, “The Importance of Emotion in Understanding and Managing ADHD (here) and one from 2012 entitled, “ADHD, Self-Regulation, and Executive Functioning: Theory and Implications for Management” (the part of it I used is here).

August 1, 2017 3

Does ADHD Coaching Work?

There are three things to know about coaching.

First, if you read Russell Barkley, scholar and researcher on ADHD, the idea of coaching makes sense. Barkley argues that what you need with ADHD is something external to guide your behavior right at the moment that the behavior’s needed.

Imagine you need to study for a job interview you have the next day and you are about to surf online. Right at that moment, with your fingers poised to tap the keyboard, you need something external to stop you (or to guide you toward stopping). This something will then need to remind you of your interview and reinforce studying over surfing. This is ideally what a coach does…guides your behavior at the moment it most matters, which is when you play the game…of job-seeking or whatever it is.

A coach guides your action as it is happening.

Second thing to know is that the reality of ADHD coaching appears to approximate this at best.

You can get a coach working with you multiple times a week and the work can center around where you most struggle. But, at best, it’s like having a coach available by phone some of the times you play the game. It’s just unrealistic to have the ideal kind of coaching…unless you’re wealthy and want to pay someone to be with you, guiding your behavior at various points of the day, as needed. Perhaps one day, we’ll have robots do this for us, should we choose…hmm.

The third thing to know is that the research on what makes for an effective ADHD coach is sorely lacking. Only a few exploratory kind of studies, primarily focused on college students, seem to look at this, with the recommendation for future larger scale, more rigorous research. So while you can find folks credentialed to be an ADHD coach, there’s no real research showing coaching clearly works and under what circumstances.

This leaves us all figuring out for ourselves, if we pursue coaching, whether it’s working. Actually, even if research clearly said it’s likely to be effective for most, we’d still have to figure out whether it was effective for us.

June 17, 2017 1

Medication Metaphor: Tunnels

Imagine yourself inside a room full of tunnels.

You can look down any of them. Maybe you like this sense of freedom. Maybe you also find it distracting.

But now you have your ADHD medication.

Walls go up over all the tunnels except the one you’re facing.

When you turn your head, the wall for the last tunnel you faced slides up. The wall for the tunnel you now face slides down.

You can switch which tunnel you look down, but you can see only one tunnel at a time.

You can also see the tunnels with obstacles.

On medication, you find it’s easier to enter these previously-avoided tunnels (maybe because the more appealing tunnels have their walls up, keeping their temptations out of sight).

And once you enter one of these “harder” tunnels, the medication helps you stay there.

This is part of the experience of ADHD medication for many of those with ADHD, on the one that’s working for them.

May 21, 2017 0

Stuck On Your Carousel?

I have long loved carousels and, for some reason, began to love them even more after reading Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes. I find them enchanting.

But when I get stuck going round and round riding the same beast (or moving from one to another on the carousel), I know it’s time to get off it.

How does anybody do this? First you have to notice that you’re on your carousel. This means identifying what’s on it.

What thoughts, emotions, etc. are the beasts that call you to it? If you have ADHD, these may include boredom, frustration, the thought “Why bother?” or “I’ll do it later.” Once you jump on one of these beasts, what does going round and round look like for you? Watching movies, playing video games, going online? Nothing wrong with these things.

If you know, though, that one round on the carousel is likely to lead to many others without your even noticing while it’s happening, consider seeing your carousel from a distance.

When you are off it, go ahead and try to create a visual of your carousel, including what thought, emotion, memory, etc. each beast represents and what behavior follows. Then when you jump on your carousel, you have a better chance of noticing this and choosing whether to keep riding or step off. And, unlike the poor souls of Bradbury’s story, you’ll be only minutes or hours older.

November 11, 2016 0

To get things started, add sugar…a spoonful or more

Just the other day, my husband played this song to our daughter, and I said, “Hey, Mary Poppins had it right.” As a mental health therapist running groups for adults diagnosed with ADHD, I encourage members to have fun with their tasks as much as possible. Turn up the pleasure, excitement, interest. Some will work outside or somewhere they find pleasant, some pair a reward with tasks and some work with others, even just as company. Some do all of these.

If you struggle to start something, remember Mary Poppins. And that some of us need a little more sugar than a spoonful.

November 7, 2016 0

“It’s like a room full of puppies and candies.”

Children often say it best.

My child said this as he heard me speaking about ADHD.

I asked him what he meant, and he said it’s what a room seems like to him. I asked him what an empty room seems like, and he described how he will notice the shapes, curves, and corners of the walls; bumps on the ceiling; light seeping under the door; and the texture of the floor, adding that carpet’s like a maze of threads. He concluded, “Even an empty room is filled with so much. It’s insane.”

November 5, 2016 1

Tag: Metaphor