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Not all diagnoses are created equal: Mothers’ narratives of children, ADHD, and comorbid diagnoses

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  • Fried, Talia
  • Plotkin-Amrami, Galia

Abstract

Social research examining patients' and caretakers' narration of mental disorders, including ADHD, has been remarkably silent about comorbidity. Centering the theme of uncertainty and the question of what is “at stake” in mothers' mental health narratives of children (Kleinman, 1988), we characterize the patchwork process by which mothers deploy ADHD and comorbid diagnoses to account for key experiences and struggles in their and their child's lives. We found that ADHD had limited purchase in accounting for the emotional and social difficulties that were most urgent in mothers' narratives, despite the medical authority behind the ADHD label, which the mothers mostly accepted. However, mothers remained pervasively uncertain about the relationship between ADHD and comorbid mental health conditions, paralleling debates on the relationship between ADHD, emotion, and comorbidity in the psychiatric and psychological literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Fried, Talia & Plotkin-Amrami, Galia, 2023. "Not all diagnoses are created equal: Mothers’ narratives of children, ADHD, and comorbid diagnoses," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 323(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:323:y:2023:i:c:s0277953623001958
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2023.115838
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    References listed on IDEAS

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