Families of Children with Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder

Buy this book »

Just like families of other students with disabilities and special needs, families of students with ADHD cannot be described using a single set of characteristics. However, it is fair to say that for many families, having a child with ADHD affects every area of family functioning and adds significant stress for parents and siblings both at home and in interactions with school personnel (Harpin, 2005). For example, Tate is a student with ADHD. Nearly every day at school, he has some sort of negative experience because of either inattention during instruction or a behavior disruption during lunch or passing periods. As a result, Tate's parents receive quite a few late-afternoon phone calls from school personnel. In trying to respond to the teachers and keep clear their expectations for Tate's school performance, they often punish him by taking away computer time or some other privilege. Tate dislikes school, dreads the phone ringing when he gets home, and feels like all his parents ever do is criticize him. His parents are very concerned that they are having an increasingly difficult time getting through to Tate about his behavior. What seems to be developing is a negative cycle of teacher-parent-child interaction that will likely lead to frustration and ineffective intervention (LeFever, Villers, Morrow, & Vaughn, 2002).

When working with families like Tate's, your job as a teacher is to try to build positive relationships by encouraging parents to reward their children for being successful and by helping them see their children's strengths (Mathur & Smith, 2003). Some parents struggle with their own role in their child's disorder, particularly when they believe that a child is "just like his father." Teachers have to be careful not to blame parents for their children's ADHD but at the same time not to condone inappropriate student behavior that a parent might excuse by saying that the child can't help it.

Families face additional concerns as their children with ADHD reach adolescence and adulthood. Although professionals used to think that children outgrew ADHD as they approached adolescence, it is now clear that for most individuals, ADHD is a lifetime disorder (Barkley, 2006; Minskoff & Allsopp, 2003). Adolescents with ADHD may have more negative moods than other teens. They also may spend more time with friends and less time with family, and they may be prone to tobacco and alcohol abuse (Whalen, Jamner, Henker, Delfino, & Lozano, 2002). Parents and family members are faced with responding to these children's emotions and potentially harmful behaviors (McCleary, 2002; Wolraich et al., 2005).

Finally, teachers should understand the varied family responses to ADHD diagnosis and treatment based on cultural differences (Mattox & Harder, 2007). For example, in one study researchers investigated the perceptions of Mexican, Mexican American, and Puerto Rican mothers toward the behavior of their children with ADHD (Schmitz & Velez, 2003). The researchers found that across these three Latino subgroups, the mothers who were the least acculturated were the least tolerant of their children's hyperactive behavior. In another study, parents from Caucasian, African American, and Hispanic groups in one community were queried about ADHD. Although children from the three groups were identified as having ADHD in approximately the same proportion, African American parents were less likely than Caucasian parents to agree to medication as an intervention, and Hispanic parents were the least likely to agree (Rowland, Umback, Stallone, Naftel, Bohlig, & Sandler, 2002).