ADHD: A Path to Success
Chapter 6 of
first 6 Chapters
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Emotional vs. Rational Controls of Behavior
A Learning Model for ADHD: Conditioned Attentional Avoidance
Loop Model
If we look at ADHD as learned behavior, and this learning produces measurable physiological changes in the child's brain, these chronic learned patterns are caused by both specific situations and broad cultural influences on the child. ADHD and the associated physiological changes in his brain are the child's adaptation to the world we have put him in, rather than being the result of traditionally hypothesized neurological defects.
The Conditioned Attentional Avoidance Loop Model Makes Neurological Theories Superfluous
There is a long and productive tradition in science to adopt the simplest, most plausible explanation for the observed data.
This tradition has been called Occam's Razor. The idea of this philosophical razor is to shave off everything that does not help explain observations. The beauty of this strategy is that it yields the simplest, most elegant explanation of one's observations.
In the case of ADHD, using Occam's Razor to shave off neurological hypotheses from Conditioned Attentional Avoidance Loop Model results in no loss of explanatory power. Conditioned Attentional Avoidance Loop Model is certainly a simpler, more parsimonious explanation of ADHD than neurologically based explanations.
The dictate of Occam's Razor is that once you have the simplest, most effective explanation for a phenomenon, you only further muddle the picture by adding logical curlicues. There is no reason to elaborate the relatively simple explanation of ADHD offered by Conditioned Attentional Avoidance Loop Model with neurological curlicues.
Conditioned Attentional Avoidance Loop Model does not rule out the claim that there is a neurological component. Such a hypothesis just does not add anything. Clinically, it is also more useful to have a theory that emphasizes variables that you can effect. Learned patterns can be changed; defective neurons can not.
First Sentence: With terror in my heart, I can still remember sitting in emotional and almost physical pain at Palm Elementary School in Beaumont, California.
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