Comparison of self-esteem and quality of life in 8-12-year-old children with ADHD with and without learning disorders

Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common disorders in school-aged children. Learning disorder (LD) is also one of the most important psychiatric disorders in children, which can often be associated with ADHD. In this study, we sought to compare self-esteem and quality of life in 8 to 12-year-old children with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder with and without co-occurring learning disorders in order to emphasize the importance of attention and diagnosis in children with ADHD.

Among the 8- to 12-year-old outpatients referred to the child and adolescent psychiatry clinic of Omid Babol Clinic, 120 children aged 8 to 12 years with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder whose disease was diagnosed by a child and adolescent psychiatry subspecialist. Among the tools used to collect information was the Colorado Learning Difficulties Questionnaire by Wilcott et al. (CLDQ), five-scale self-esteem test of Pepe et al. (1989) for children and quality-of-life questionnaire for 8–12-year-old children (PedsQL).

This study investigated self-esteem and quality of life in children with ADHD (n = 120, 51.7% boys). Children with ADHD and learning disabilities reported significantly lower self-esteem and quality of life compared to those with ADHD alone.

Considering the relatively high probability of co-occurrence of ADHD and learning disorders, if one of them is diagnosed in a child, it is possible to look for other disorders in the child in order to avoid the more severe negative effects that this co-occurrence can have on the child by diagnosing it as soon as possible.