Gender Differences in Children's Hyperactivity, Inattention, and Impulsivity

冲动、注意力不集中和过度活跃的孩子比他们的同龄人有更大的社交和学业问题，至少在美国是这样。老师和家长发现这些行为很难管理，尤其是在儿童中期。本研究将采用比较的、跨文化的设计来澄清这些行为是否相似，对孩子产生相同的后果，并对不同国家的父母和老师构成相同的挑战。这对儿童在跨文化环境下的学习和发展具有重要意义，无论是在美国的多民族教室还是在国际上。它还暗示了儿童行为被归类为问题行为的条件，以及如何对这些行为进行干预，以促进儿童及其照顾者的学业和社会福祉。将对三个国家的儿童进行比较：美国（德克萨斯州）、墨西哥和伯利兹。之所以选择这些文化背景，是因为他们对孩子的健谈和活动有不同的老师和家长的价值观。冲动、注意力不集中和过度活跃行为的社会和学术后果将在这些环境中进行比较。孩子们的行为将在家里、教室和操场上进行评估，综合运用人类学、生物学和心理学的方法。将特别关注行为上的性别差异，因为先前的临床研究表明，严重的冲动、注意力不集中和多动行为更可能出现在男孩身上。通过使用生物文化研究设计，关注行为的生物和文化背景，本研究将能够阐明文化和生物变异在产生这些行为的性别差异中的作用。目前，对于女孩和男孩的行为模式，以及他们可能从老师、家长和其他孩子那里得到的不同反应，人们知之甚少。这项研究还暗示了儿童的学业和社会福祉，以及为什么它可能因性别和种族而异。大多数先前的研究只关注这些行为的病理或极端程度，而忽略了大多数孩子至少偶尔会表现出这些行为的事实。然而，即使是较小程度的冲动、注意力不集中和过度活跃的行为也可能对许多孩子产生重大的积极或消极的影响。这项研究将为这些行为的自然发生范围提供第一个明确的证据，并且应该引起人类学，心理学和教育领域的研究人员的兴趣。

Impulsive, inattentive and hyperactive children have greater social and academic problems than their peers, at least in the U.S. Teachers and parents find these behaviors difficult to manage, especially in mid-childhood. This research will use a comparative, cross-cultural design to clarify whether these behaviors are similar, have the same consequences for children, and pose the same challenges to parents and teachers, in different countries. This has significant implications for child learning and development in cross-cultural circumstances, whether in multi-ethnic classrooms in the U.S. or internationally. It also has implications for conditions in which children's behavior becomes classified as problem behavior, and how interventions for these behaviors might be designed to promote academic and social wellbeing for children and their caregivers.The comparison will be made between children in three countries: US (Texas), Mexico, and Belize. These cultural settings have been chosen because they have varying teacher and parent values about children's talkativeness and activity. Social and academic consequences of impulsive, inattentive, and hyperactive behaviors will be compared across these settings. Children's behavior will be assessed at home, in the classroom and on the playground, using a combination of anthropological, biological, and psychological methods.Particular attention will be paid to sex differences in behavior, because previous clinical studies have shown that severe levels of impulsive, inattentive and hyperactive behavior are much more likely to be found in boys. By using a biocultural research design, focusing on both biological and cultural contexts of the behaviors, this study will be able to clarify the roles of cultural and biological variation in producing sex differences in these behaviors. Currently, there is a poor understanding of the girls' and boys' behavior patterns, and the different reactions they may get from teachers, parents and other children. This research also has implications for children's academic and social well being, and why it may vary by sex and ethnicity. Most previous studies have focused only on pathological or extreme degrees of these behaviors, ignoring the fact that most children display these behaviors at least occasionally. Yet, even lesser degrees of impulsive, inattentive and hyperactive behavior may also have significant positive or negative consequences for many children. This study will provide the first clear evidence of the naturally occurring range of these behaviors and should be of interest to researchers in the fields of anthropology, psychology and education.