Behaviour treatment helped children with ADHD in studies that had a group to compare.

The review

1. 01

   Who took part

   174 studies with 2,094 children and teenagers under 18 who had ADHD or ADHD-like behaviour. In the 20 studies with a comparison group, 523 children got the treatment.

2. 02

   What they did

   Children got behaviour treatments such as rewards for good behaviour and parent training. These were given at home, at school, or with peers. Controlled studies compared children with other groups. The other designs compared each child's results before and after treatment.

3. 03

   What happened

   In studies with a comparison group, treatment gave a clear gain. Studies with no comparison group gave much bigger gains, so those numbers are hard to compare. Academic results came from only three studies, and they are less clear.

What the review found

1. HelpedOther outcomes

   Behaviour treatments, like rewards, helped children with ADHD more than the other groups did.

   Pooled analysis of 20 studies · vs children who got something else or nothing · ⚠ whole programmes were tested, so no single part can be credited; mixes trials with other kinds of study

2. HelpedGoals

   Children with ADHD who had behaviour treatment did slightly better on school tests in three studies.

   Pooled analysis of 3 studies · vs children who got something else or nothing · ⚠ whole programmes were tested, so no single part can be credited; mixes trials with other kinds of study

3. No comparisonGoals

   Children with ADHD finished much more of their work during behaviour treatment than before it.

   Pooled analysis of 26 studies · no comparison group · behaviour was recorded · ⚠ results look too good to be true; whole programmes were tested, so no single part can be credited; mixes trials with other kinds of study

Source