Classroom behavior among children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

The main symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) - low attention, impulsive behavior, and hyperactivity - become obvious especially in classroom situations and are reported to be very problematical by teachers. This study compared the behavior of normal children and children with ADHD during lessons. For the classroom behavior observation we used the "Munchener Aufmerksamkeitsinventar" (MAI; Helmke, 1988; Helmke & Renkl, 1992). This instrument can be applied to negative and appropriate behavior as well as to the situational context (e.g., highly or less structured situations). 55 ADHD children were selected by the "teacher Rating Scale" (Conners, 1969) and DSM III-R criteria (teacher's judgments) out of a total sample of 569 primary school students. The study was based on matched pairs of 55 ADHD and 55 unaffected children (control group). As expected, there were remarkable differences between the two groups regarding their classroom behavior. The ADHD children were more active and disturbing in all categories of behavior and showed a general lack of appropriate classroom behavior. The analysis of situational conditions indicated that different contexts influence the behavior of all children. There were no differences between the two groups. The correlations between the observational data and the teachers' judgments are sufficiently high. The highest correlation was found between the adequate classroom behavior as registered by the observer and teacher judgement. Adequate classroom behavior is the best predictor of teachers' ratings.