The ADHD spectrum includes problems with hyperactivity, impulsive behavior and inattention that are present before the age of seven. Some people think that if someone has ADHD, they are unable to sustain attention. That's wrong. ADHD is often as much a condition of variable attention than it is of inattention. Some children with ADHD can go to a penny arcade and play video games for hours on end, even racking up the "high score" for a given machine. It is a paradox. People with ADHD are commonly able to hyperfocus on material that they find exciting or stimulating.
ADHD can manifest itself by the inability to perform unstimulating tasks such as cleaning your room or waiting your turn as a child, or paying the monthly bills as an adult. ADHD sufferers may find such bland tasks so noxious they notoriously procrastinate and put them off. Ironically, then they may finally confront the need to complete the delayed work, do it "or else!". In this artificially created, highly stimulating "do or die" crisis situation, someone with ADHD can go into hyperfocus mode for longer more intense periods of "attention" than someone without the impairment. The classic example of this is the child who does no homework, then stays up all night cramming for the test, and passes.
Why do some kids have such difficulties concentrating, planning and organizing while others don't? We don't know for sure. We do know that the medications that treat ADHD affect Dopamine and Norepinephrine. There are many different ways that one can wind up with symptoms of ADHD including brain damage and environmental influences. There is a heavy genetic component to the condition.
Symptom checklists and assesment instruments are helpful, but ultimately ADHD is a condition that a doctor diagnoses clinically using his judgment and experience in the context of a patient-doctor interaction.
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