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Yeah, this is always a thing. I know ADHDers in general tend to do well on certain kinds of tests that are supposed to test attention and executive function because it's easy to hyperfocus in a clinical setting. It doesn't help you have researchers like Barkley saying (with no research to back him up) that "ADHDers don't hyperfocus, they perseverate." And while hyperfocus may be a form of perseveration, this sort of implies it's not focus.

Hmm, that's interesting, what's meant by perseveration as opposed to hyper focus in this context? That attention is given to something for sustained periods in little blocks with gaps, rather than for sustained periods with no gaps? Am I completely wrong on that?

Who's this Barkley chap? I'd perhaps like to peruse his work.

Russell Barkley, he's a very prominent ADHD-focused researcher/clinician. He tends to present a fairly grim picture and shoot down any ideas that ADHD has any positive traits, and I think this is why he quibbles over what to call hyperfocus.

What he means is you keep doing something that you "should have stopped doing." So you start to play a video game or read a book or maybe editing an image in photoshop pixel by pixel and do it for hours unless interrupted (and interruption can be difficult), and that this is a form of perseveration even though it is not always repetitive, just difficult to stop (and you probably don't want to stop). Plus the assumption you should be doing something else is a bit out there. That is, it's sustained periods with no gaps. If there were small gaps, it would be easier to stop.

Anyway, he said autistic people hyperfocus, ADHDers do not. And then someone else made the distinction that hyperfocus was having an intense focused interest that you engage in for long periods of time while the ADHD perseveration was the above, but I think a lot of ADHDers and autistic people do both (although the interest thing in perhaps different ways).

Thanks for that, Vervandi.

I wouldn't like to make any claims about what is what.

My current thinking is that hyperfocus is itself a kind of attentional anomaly on the opposite end to ADD which I think of as basically an inability to latch focus on anything. Most people seem to operate somewhere in the middle.

Some of what you described, i.e. 'keep doing something that you "should have stopped doing." is something I do a lot. I used to call it procrastination, but I'm beginning to associate it with executive function, or lack thereof, although it could be a manifestation of OCD.

It seems very difficult for me to separate what is autism, what is ADD what is OCD what is executive function disorder. Or perhaps some of them are elements of the same thing.

I'm not in a strong position to make a clean separation between ADHD and autism, but I will say that a ton of ADHDers do experience hyperfocus in the sense of focusing on one thing for hours at a time. I don't think ADHD is strictly an inability to latch focus onto anything at all, and I think ADHDers are able to focus. It's seems to be more a matter of control (executive function). I think it's hard to direct my focus onto things I don't really want to do (but often need to do), and easy to direct my focus onto things I really want to do (whether I need to do them or not).

So I don't think hyperfocus is an anomaly for ADHDers, but simply part of that continuum of being unable to control and direct one's focus at will. I do think that hyperfocus really only happens with stuff one enjoys doing, or something that perhaps needs to be done ASAP and the deadline is staring you in the face.

It could be perseveration, and I think sometimes it is sometimes it isn't.

Yeah, I posted a link to something about that recently. It's a seemingly common trait; inability to focus on what's uninteresting, super focus on what is interesting.



I meant that it might be 'abnormal' for most (average) people. Kinda makes the whole acronym redundant, hey? I suppose it's easier to say Attention Deficit Disorder, than Situationally Dependent Attention Deficit or Surfeit Disorder (or SDADSD for short).



I agree, I'm putting off all the stuff I have to complete for tomorrow until tomorrow. it's a hairy way of operating, but until I find a real good fix for my executive function deficits, this is just how I naturally operate.



I'm going to think about perseveration.

Last edited by Moog on 10 Feb 2011, 6:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Will you be doing that for awhile?

Oops, sorry, I should be clearer. That's in folks with ADHD.



That's so funny, because I'd do the same thing.



Yes, I'm going to persevere at perseveration

Sorry about the dodgy quoting.