Deconstructing ADHD

Book excerpt: Deconstructing ADHD: Mental Disorder or Social Construct? is the third volume of the Ethics International Press Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series. Understanding the current systems of psychology and psychiatry is profoundly important. So is exploring alternatives. The Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series presents solicited chapters from international experts on a wide variety of underexplored subjects. This is a series for mental health researchers, teachers, and practitioners, for parents and interested lay readers, and for anyone trying to make sense of anxiety, depression, and other emotional difficulties. Millions of children and their parents worldwide are affected by the current biomedical paradigm by which childhood mental illnesses are addressed. This volume focuses on the “mental disorder” known as ADHD and examines whether or not it should be considered a mental disorder, and how the observable behaviors that get a child an ADHD label can be remediated without the use of powerful gateway chemicals.