2nd things, Got ADHD? Got a friend? You Need One.

It’s not good enough to simply stop the aggression.

He has to have a friend too, and a good friend at that.

If you’re still concerned about my last blog post in which I focused on:  First Things First Stop Aggression in ADHD Children then you need to get in touch with me.

If you’re in Indiana I can do child counseling with you. However, I will also offer a coaching program for parents in the coming weeks who want to improve their ability to manage their ADHD children. Obviously partly this would relate to managing aggression and or anger management for children.  However if you’re not in Indiana I would use more of a coaching format which I will describe at a later date. The issue of aggression is the inverse of today’s blog post. ADHD? Got a Friend? Why do you need a friend to graduate from high school?  You will see…

Does your child with ADHD have a friend, a chum or a buddy?  If not it is time now to address that.  I consider developing friendships as #2 in the sequence of prevention of all those upsetting co-morbid problems that can come with ADHD.  Arguably, having a good friend is the antidote to aggression. If you know how to develop and keep friendships it has an inoculating or buffering effect.  You will be less stressed out and as you will see in later posts, better able to pay attention.  (Think of the lunch money bully.  If he’s on your mind, school isn’t.)

I think one of the biggest mistakes that many parents make in the development of their children is a lack of focus on their social development.  You see lots of parents willing to buy unusual gadgets with the hope that it will develop their child’s intelligence. They’ll spend tons of money on sports coaching or equipment.  However, are parents willing to take the effort to schedule a play date? I know, I agree the term play date sounds a little bit too cute for me too. Do you choose your house based upon the fact that there are kids your son’s age for him to play with?  Maybe you should.  Having a good friend, a good buddy for a boy or a girl is very important. I won’t even get into the other social and emotional reasons why it’s important and there are obviously many of those.  Today let’s just consider academic achievement as a reason why developing friendships is important.  Yes, you got that right.  It will help his academic achievement. 

Harry Stack Sullivan developed this idea called “chum”. To put it in simple terms your chum, is your best buddy. If your child can’t name his best buddy then you should put some time and effort into helping him find a good friend.  Then you should spend your time and effort providing a context in which he can play with that friend. This means that he needs oversight from you, adult supervision.  He needs some independence, but he also needs some supervision.  Having friends when he’s young very much relates to success when he gets older.

As you may recall from previous post studies with larger sample sizes that are better designed weigh more heavily in their empirical importance. This means that longitudinal studies are particularly important albeit very difficult to do. So when I found this 17 year long longitudinal study that tested whether low peer-perceived acceptance in association with aggressive disruptive friends during preadolescence predicted student’s failure to graduate from high school I opened my eyes.

In this study, there were 997 Caucasian French speaking boys from low social economic status in urban neighborhoods in France.  The boys were recruited during kindergarten at age 6 and followed through age 23. Greater childhood aggression and disruptiveness predicted friends’ preadolescent aggression and disruptiveness. Having aggressive and disruptive friends was related to a lower likelihood of graduation from high school.  Yes, this was in France, but these concepts and data trends do not know cultural barriers. 

Before you quickly dismiss this, remember this is a large scale study which is well-designed.  You need to take these results seriously.  However these results do not surprise me at all given my experience as a child psychologist.  When you look at the research you find that having a good friend matters very much. In fact the sense of connection or attachment to your primary caregiver, often your mother, is absolutely critical.  Then your sense of connection to your teachers (Remember your favorite grade school teacher?  I do.  Mrs. Lorton at Mohawk Trails.)  also matters.  And, your connection to your classmates has an impact on a variety of achievement variables, academic achievement not just social achievement. I will consider some of those in later posts.

The primary point I want you to consider now is that it really does matter that he has a friend.

If he’s complaining that he doesn’t have any friends. Then your ears should perk up and you should get to work on doing something about it.

Having a good buddy, a chum, really is #2 in prevention of the more problematic co-morbid ADHD problems. 

If he doesn’t have a chum it’s time to do something about it.

He needs your help and your guidance.

“Do peers contribute to the likelihood of secondary school graduation among disadvantaged boys?”Véronneau, Marie-Hélène; Vitaro, Frank; Pedersen, Sara; Tremblay, Richard E. Journal of Educational Psychology. Vol 100(2), May 2008, 429-442.

Dr. Charles Shinaver

Located in Carmel, Indiana near Indianapolis, Noblesville, Fishers, Zionsville, and Westfield.

Parent of Children at Guerin Catholic and Our Lady of Mount Carmel Schools.

 Host of                                        And provider of

 Clarity4Health.com            Cogmed Working Memory Training^TM

Life Coaching, BeachBody Coaching and ADHD & Cogmed Coaching you through web and phone: 

No matter where you are.

371-641-7794, clarity4health@gmail.com