Biomedical subjects

Richard Milich

Publications and source records attributed to Richard Milich.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

The effects of thematic importance on story recall among children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and comparison children.

This study examined the recall of televised stories for younger (4-6 years) and older (7-9 years) children with and without attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) under two different viewing conditions (toys present/toys absent). Each child watched two Rugrats television programs, once with toys present and once with toys absent. Immediately after viewing a program, the child completed a free recall of the observed story. Comparison children's recall increased more than ADHD children's as importance level increased, and comparison children recalled more information overall than children with ADHD. When toys were present, children with ADHD retold less coherent stories than comparison children, as indexed by smaller correlations between the story units recalled and the order of these units in the story. In summary, children with ADHD demonstrated multiple difficulties in story comprehension. These findings add to our understanding of the differences in higher-order cognitive processing abilities between children with ADHD and comparison children, and suggest important areas of focus in designing more effective academic interventions for children with ADHD.

Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity↗

PubMed2006

Online story comprehension among children with ADHD: which core deficits are involved?

Children with ADHD have difficulty understanding causal connections and goal plans within stories. This study examined mediators of group differences in story narrations between children ages 7-9 with and without ADHD, including as potential mediators both the core deficits of ADHD (i.e., inattention, disinhibition, planning/working memory) as well measures of phonological processing and verbal skills. Forty-nine children with ADHD and 67 non-referred children narrated a wordless book and completed tasks assessing the core deficits of ADHD, phonological processing, and verbal skills. Results revealed that, although no shorter than those of non-referred children, the narratives of children with ADHD contained fewer elements relating to the story's causal structure and goal plan. Deficits in sustained attention accounted for the most variance in these differences. Results have implications for understanding and ameliorating the academic problems experienced by children with ADHD.

Achievement↗

PubMed2006

Disentangling the relation between television viewing and cognitive processes in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and comparison children.

OBJECTIVES: To develop causal hypotheses regarding the effects of television viewing on cognitive processes in children and to examine the proposition that deleterious effects of television may be stronger among children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. DESIGN: Longitudinal study involving 2 phases occurring 18 months apart. SETTING: University research facilities in Lexington. PARTICIPANTS: Fifty-nine children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and 106 comparison children. The children's mean age was 7.18 years at phase 1 and 8.74 years at phase 2. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Laboratory measures of visual attention to television, cognitive engagement to televised stories, factual recall of televised stories, and causal recall of televised stories. Parental reports of a child's weekly television viewing. RESULTS: Among comparison children, phase 1 television viewing negatively predicted phase 2 visual attention and phase 2 cognitive engagement (after accounting for phase 1 levels of the outcome variables and any relevant demographic variables). Also among comparison children, phase 1 attention negatively predicted phase 2 television viewing, even after accounting for phase 1 levels of television viewing and relevant demographic variables. These patterns were not observed among children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. CONCLUSIONS: Contrary to recent arguments, television viewing was associated with cognitive abilities in comparison children but not children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, a finding that suggests more careful examinations of the relation between television viewing and children's cognitive abilities are in order. Future studies should consider the possibility that any effects of television may be limited to certain developmental periods.

Attention↗

PubMed2006

Cognitive engagement and story comprehension in typically developing children and children with ADHD from preschool through elementary school.

The present study examined children's cognitive engagement with television as a function of the continuity of central or incidental content and whether this varied with age and clinical status. In Experiment 1, 9- to 11-year-old children's response times on a secondary task were slower the later a probe occurred in a sequence of central events, and response times predicted recall. Experiment 2 extended these results to 6- to 8-year-old children. Experiment 3 revealed that children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) failed to show the pattern consistently observed for comparison children. The results support the hypothesis that typically developing children build a representation during viewing that reflects the causal structure of the televised story but that this skill is deficient in 4- to 9-year-old children with ADHD.

Age Factors↗

PubMed2005

Intervention groups for adolescents with conduct problems: is aggregation harmful or helpful?

Past research has suggested that the aggregation of deviant peers during treatment may cause harmful effects (T. J. Dishion, J. McCord, & F. Poulin, 1999). This study compared the effectiveness of problem-solving skills training groups in which all members had conduct problems ("pure" group condition) with groups that consisted of adolescents with and without behavior problems ("mixed" group condition). Participants were 139 sixth- and seventh-graders (mean age = 12.7; 63% male; 55% White) enrolled at public middle schools. Pre-, post-, and 6-month follow-up data were collected, along with intervention process variables. Results showed that, contrary to the deviancy training hypothesis, adolescents in the pure-group condition engaged in more adaptive in-session behavior and received lower scores on the parent and teacher ratings of externalizing behavior at postintervention than those in the mixed-group condition. Mediation analyses showed that the deviancy training that occurred in the mixed-group condition accounted for their worse postintervention scores, findings consistent with the deviancy training hypothesis.

Achievement↗

PubMed2005

A friend in need: the role of friendship quality as a protective factor in peer victimization and bullying.

This study examined friendship quality as a possible moderator of risk factors in predicting peer victimization and bullying. Children (50 boys and 49 girls, ages 10 to 13 years) reported on the quality of their best friendship, as well as their bullying and victimization tendencies. Parents reported on their child's internalizing and externalizing behaviors, in addition to bullying and victimization tendencies. Results indicated that externalizing problems were related to bullying behavior; however, friendship quality moderated this relation such that among children with externalizing behaviors, a high-quality friendship significantly attenuated bullying behavior. Internalizing problems and low friendship quality were significantly related to victimization; however, friendship quality did not moderate the relation between internalizing problems and victimization. Implications for interventions based on these findings are discussed.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2004

Early adolescent through young adult alcohol and marijuana use trajectories: early predictors, young adult outcomes, and predictive utility.

The present study takes a developmental approach to subgrouping and examines the trajectories of substance use from early adolescence through young adulthood among a community sample of 481 individuals. The patterns of use were examined, subgroups were identified separately for men and women and for alcohol and marijuana, and psychosocial predictors and psychopathology outcomes that differentiated the groups were identified. The results revealed three substantially overlapping subgroups for both alcohol and marijuana: early onset, late onset, and nonuser. Although the general patterns of which dependent variables were related to group were similar for alcohol and marijuana, a closer examination revealed important subgroup differences. For alcohol use, the early-onset group was more dysfunctional in terms of predictors and outcomes whereas the late-onset and nonuser groups were better adjusted. In contrast, for marijuana, the early- and late-onset groups were both more dysfunctional than the nonuser group. In a final analysis, we examined the predictive utility of our developmental approach to subgrouping compared to a traditional, static approach.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2004

Difficulties in comprehending causal relations among children with ADHD: the role of cognitive engagement.

The present study examined whether time spent in long looks (i.e., >or=15 s), an index of cognitive engagement, would account for differences between children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and comparison children in understanding causal relations. Children viewed two televised stories, once in the presence of toys and once in their absence. Dependent variables were visual attention and questions tapping factual information and causal relations. Comparison children answered significantly more causal relations questions than did the children with ADHD, but only in the toys-present condition. Four lines of evidence revealed that the difficulties children with ADHD had in answering causal relations questions in the toys-present condition could be linked specifically to this group's decreased time spent in long looks.

Attention↗

PubMed2004

Story comprehension and the impact of studying on recall in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

This study examined the impact of studying on story comprehension and recall among children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Participants in the study were 36 children with ADHD and 43 nonreferred comparison children ages 7 to 11. The participants listened to 1 of 2 folktales and recalled the story both before and after studying a written version of the story for up to 10 min. The stories had been divided into individual events, and each event was coded for the number of causal connections it had to other story events. Each event was presented on a separate page of the study booklet so that time spent on each event could be recorded. All of the transcribed recalls were coded for which story events the participant correctly recalled. For both groups, recall increased as the number of causal connections increased, but the effect of the number of causal connections on recall was stronger for comparison children than for children with ADHD. The results revealed no group differences in studying behavior. However, when recall before studying was included as a predictor of recall after studying, studying was found to be more effective for higher IQ comparison children than for higher IQ children with ADHD, especially at the highest levels of causal connections. The results offer important leads for the development of academic interventions that are specific to the story-comprehension deficits of children with ADHD.

Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity↗

PubMed2003

On-line story representation in boys with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) face an increased risk of poor achievement in school. Thus, knowledge of the cognitive processing abilities of children with ADHD is critical to understanding and improving their academic performance. Although many studies have focused on the specific nature of the attention deficit experienced by children with ADHD, few have examined higher order cognitive processing such as comprehension of stories. The present study examined the processes of encoding story information, building a story representation, and modifying a story representation in boys with ADHD and nonreferred boys. Boys were asked to narrate a story from a picture book twice. Boys with ADHD showed deficits in representing goals and goal plans in their narrations, as compared to nonreferred boys. Boys with ADHD also committed more errors than nonreferred boys, but did correct certain types of errors on their second telling. Implications are discussed in terms of future research needed to identify the cognitive deficits that account for these narrative deficits.

Attention↗

PubMed2003

Attributional biases in aggressive children and their mothers.

To investigate if mothers and their aggressive children share the tendency to infer hostile motives from others' behavior in ambiguous social situations, 100 pairs of mothers and their clinic-referred or comparison children (50 boys and 50 girls) were asked to interpret hypothetical situations involving both overtly and relationally provocative scenarios. Results replicated previous findings of studies on social information processing of aggressive children and extended the findings to mothers of aggressive children. Findings were generally consistent with the hypothesis that mothers of aggressive children tend to view others' ambiguous actions as hostile, increasing the probability of responding with aggression and, in effect, modeling a hostile attributional bias for their children. Examinations of mothers' and their children's attributional and behavioral intentions suggested that mothers' and daughters' attributions and behavioral intentions were significantly correlated, whereas mothers' and sons' were not. Gender effects with regard to provocation type are also discussed.

Aggression↗

PubMed2003

Relation between childhood disruptive behavior disorders and substance use and dependence symptoms in young adulthood: individuals with symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and conduct disorder are uniquely at risk.

Most prior literature examining the relations among attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), conduct disorder (CD), and substance use and abuse suggests that CD fully account for the ADHD-substance abuse relation. This study sought to test an alternate theory that individuals with symptoms of both ADHD and CD are at a special risk for substance abuse. Relations between childhood ADHD and CD symptoms, and young adult tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and hard drug use and dependence symptoms, were examined in a sample of 481 young adults. ADHD and CD symptoms interacted to predict marijuana dependence symptoms and hard drug use and dependence symptoms, such that individuals with high levels of both ADHD and CD had the highest levels of these outcomes.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Taking offense: effects of personality and teasing history on behavioral and emotional reactions to teasing.

This study investigated how global personality traits and teasing history are related to participants' emotional and behavioral reactions to an actual teasing event. College undergraduates (N = 108) worked on a task with a same-sex confederate. While interacting, the confederate either teased participants about how slowly they were working on the task or made a benign comment about the nature of the task. Analyses revealed that even mild teasing can generate negativity towards the teaser and interaction. More interestingly, however, personality moderated reactions to teasing, as teasing condition interacted with each of the Big Five personality domains in theoretically meaningful ways. Childhood teasing history also moderated reactions to teasing, as frequent victims and frequent teasers responded in different ways.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Online cognitive engagement of boys with ADHD.

The present study was designed to examine the role that attentional problems may play in accounting for difficulties in story comprehension experienced by children with ADHD. A secondary task methodology was used to examine whether or not online variations in cognitive engagement with a televised story were related to the continuity of central or incidental information. Twenty-two 9- to 11 -year-old boys with ADHD and 36 of their nonreferred peers watched a television program and responded to auditory probes presented at preselected points during continuous sequences of central or incidental information. The reaction times to the probes for nonreferred boys showed the expected linear increase in cognitive engagement (i.e., the RTs increased) as central, plot-relevant sequences continued. In contrast, boys with ADHD showed the expected increase in RTs relatively late in the central sequences. The results were discussed in terms of how delays in engaging with central information may contribute to the academic difficulties experienced by boys with ADHD.

Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity↗

PubMed2002

Understanding the relations among gender, disinhibition, and disruptive behavior in adolescents.

This study examined whether disinhibition shows similar relations with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and conduct disorder (CD) symptomatology among male and female adolescents. The mixed-incentive or punishment condition of Newman's go/no-go task was administered to 172 adolescents. As expected, ADHD symptoms in boys and girls were predictive of disinhibition (i.e., commission errors) in the mixed-incentive but not punishment condition. Also consistent with expectations, CD symptoms in boys were predictive of disinhibition in the mixed-incentive but not punishment condition. In contrast, CD symptoms in girls were not predictive of disinhibition in either condition. These findings are discussed in terms of implications for understanding sex differences in the etiology of ADHD and CD.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2002

The relations among personality, symptoms of alcohol and marijuana abuse, and symptoms of comorbid psychopathology: results from a community sample.

This study examined the relation of the Five-Factor Model (FFM) of personality to symptoms of alcohol and marijuana abuse before and after controlling for symptoms of antisocial personality disorder (APD) and internalizing psychopathology. The 481 participants completed a well-validated measure of the FFM and a structured diagnostic interview at age 21 years. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated that unique constellations of personality characteristics were associated with symptoms of alcohol abuse, marijuana abuse, APD, and internalizing disorders. For example, symptoms of alcohol abuse were associated with high Extraversion and low Conscientiousness, whereas symptoms of marijuana abuse were characterized by low Extraversion and high Openness to Experience. Findings have implications for models of the etiology and treatment of substance use and abuse.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

Comprehension of televised stories in boys with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder and nonreferred boys.

Two studies compared comprehension of televised stories by 7- to 12-year-old boys with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and nonreferred comparison boys. Boys watched one show with toys present and one with toys absent. Visual attention was continuously recorded, and recall was tested after each show. Across studies, visual attention was high with toys absent but decreased sharply with toys present for boys with ADHD. Groups showed similar levels of cued recall of discrete units of information regardless of differences in attention. When recall tasks and television story structure required knowledge of relations among events, the reduced attention of boys with ADHD interfered with recall. Although visual attention of comparison boys also decreased to some extent with toys present, there was no such decrement in recall. Implications of the difficulties children with ADHD have in integrated story comprehension are discussed.

Attention↗

PubMed1992

Methylphenidate and attributions in boys with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.

In Experiment 1, 28 attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) boys underwent a double-blind, placebo-controlled medication assessment in a summer day-treatment program. Daily, boys were asked questions to assess their attributions for and evaluations of their behavior. Objective measures showed improved behavior with methylphenidate; however, boys tended to attribute their performance to effort rather than to medication, particularly when medicated. Experiment 2 involved 38 ADHD boys the following summer and replicated the procedures in Experiment 1, with the addition of a no-pill condition and a comparison of attributions for success and failure outcomes. Simply taking a pill (no-pill vs. placebo comparison) did not show significant effects, whereas the results of Experiment 1 were replicated with placebo-methylphenidate comparisons. Across drug conditions a self-enhancing attributional pattern was obtained; the majority of attributions for success were to ability or effort, whereas attributions for failure were to the pill or to counselors.

Attention↗