ADHD PSYCHOLOGY
Assignment: During Christmas dinner with your extended family, Uncle Charlie – who never seems to be at a loss for words – starts ranting about your 8-year-old son, Jonas, whom Uncle Charlie describes as “hyper.” “You guys need to learn to control your kid.” he tells you, as your spouse’s face turns beet red. (Your spouse also looks at you as if to say, “Why do we keep inviting this guy?”) You lean in and say, “Uncle Charlie, you’re right. We saw that his behavior was a problem. In fact, just last week we took Jonas for an evaluation and he was diagnosed with ADHD. We’re going to put him on medication as soon as the holidays are over and he goes back to school.” Uncle Charlie looks at you as though you had just stepped out of a UFO. “Are you kidding me? You guys are out of your mind! I can’t believe you’re such suckers that you would fall for this nonsense!” “What do you mean?” you ask. “ADHD is bogus. It’s something that the drug companies thought up so that they could make big bucks selling you bogus medication! I remember when I was a kid. There was no such thing as ADHD. When a kid was wild, the parents and teachers would put him in his place, and then he behaved himself. It was really very simple. The problem is that today, nobody disciplines anymore. The kid is wild? Drug him up! Stick on a label of ADHD and let him think that he can do whatever the heck he wants!” How would you explain to Uncle Charlie – using resources and examples – what ADHD is, and how medication and therapy can help treat the disorder? You must also use at least three outside sources, and cite your sources so that you avoid plagiarism. The sources should be given within the essays so that the reader knows clearly which information is from which source. When giving the sources, you must provide enough information for the reader to find the citation. So writing “The New York Times” is not enough. You may provide a hyperlink to the web page you are citing from or give the name of the article, the author’s name, the date (if one is given), and where the article was published.