The aim of the present systematic review was to consolidate findings related to emotion recognition accuracy among individuals with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The review also examined emotion recognition accuracy assessment methods as well as the contribution of gender to emotional recognition accuracy.

A total of 43 articles were identified based on inclusion criteria using PRISMA guidelines for article retrieval.

58% of retrieved articles reported significantly decreased emotion recognition accuracy among individuals with ADHD relative to neurotypical peers, with either global or emotion-specific differences identified. Notably, studies finding a significant difference in emotion recognition accuracy were of significantly lower quality according to a quality review checklist than the articles finding no difference (p < .001). For example, when use of control conditions and multiple measures of emotion recognition accuracy were employed, no study found a significant difference in emotion recognition accuracy between individuals with and without ADHD. Regarding potential gender differences, not a single study included gender diversity beyond sex assigned at birth. The majority (86%) of studies included a predominantly male sample, with 15% including only male participants. While differences in emotion recognition accuracy were found between male and female participants in 7% of cases, future research is needed to identify the contribution of gender diversity.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is defined as a persistent pattern of inattention and hyperactivity-impulsivity that interferes with functioning anofd development. Increased emotional reactivity and impaired emotion regulation are established findings in children with ADHD. Impairments in executive functions such as impulse control and working memory, in turn, have also been suggested to have a negative effect on emotion recognition. However, studies exploring suspected deficits in the ability to recognise facial emotions in ADHD have to date yielded controversial results. We sought to clarify the mechanism of possible emotion recognition dysfunction in children with ADHD.

Sixty-one children diagnosed with ADHD (aged 10.36 ± 1.89 years) and a control group (N = 78; aged 9.6 ± 1.8 years) were evaluated with questionnaires and computerized tests for cognitive and facial emotion recognition capacity.

The ADHD group displayed more behavioural issues and performed worse in cognitive tests compared to the control group. Group status (i.e. ADHD vs. control group) did not predict facial emotion recognition when controlled for age, IQ and sex in linear regression models. Performance in Divided Attention predicted facial emotion recognition in linear regression in the ADHD group.

Individuals with ADHD showed facial emotion recognition capacity similar to a typically developing control group. Good performance in a cognitive test assessing divided attention predicted capacity for facial emotion recognition, but only in the ADHD group.

Previous studies that have assessed social cognition in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) have produced inconsistent findings. To summarize these data and shed light upon moderators that may explain observed inconsistencies, we conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis exploring social cognition (Theory of Mind (ToM), Empathy, Facial and Non-Facial Emotion Recognition) and Everyday Social Skills in children and adolescents with ADHD.

The current meta-analysis involved 142 studies including 652 effect sizes. These studies compared children and adolescents with ADHD (n = 8,300) and with typical development (n = 7,983).

Participants with ADHD exhibited moderate to very large deficits in ToM (SMD = 0.84, 95% CI = 0.68-0.99), Facial Emotion Recognition (SMD = 0.63, 95% CI = 0.46-0.81), and Everyday Social Skills (SMD = 1.23, 95% CI = 1.08-1.37). The magnitude of these impairments was similar when considering effect sizes adjusted for some covariates and the methodological quality of the studies. Few studies have investigated Empathy and Non-Facial Emotion Recognition, which precludes definitive conclusions.

Children and adolescents with ADHD experience robust impairments in ToM, Facial Emotion Recognition and Everyday Social Skills. Future studies should explore whether these deficits are a consequence of difficulties in other areas of cognition (e.g., executive functioning). We have made all our raw data open access to facilitate the use of the present work by the community (e.g., clinicians looking for tools, assessing social impairments, or researchers designing new studies).

Survivors of pediatric brain tumors (SPBT) experience significant social challenges, including fewer friends and greater isolation than peers. Difficulties in face processing and visual social attention have been implicated in these outcomes. This study evaluated facial expression recognition (FER), social attention, and their associations with social impairments in SPBT.

SPBT (N = 54; ages 7-16) at least 2 years post treatment completed a measure of FER, while parents completed measures of social impairment. A subset (N = 30) completed a social attention assessment that recorded eye gaze patterns while watching videos depicting pairs of children engaged in joint play. Social Prioritization scores were calculated, with higher scores indicating more face looking. Correlations and regression analyses evaluated associations between variables, while a path analysis modeling tool (PROCESS) evaluated the indirect effects of Social Prioritization on social impairments through emotion-specific FER.

Poorer recognition of angry and sad facial expressions was significantly correlated with greater social impairment. Social Prioritization was positively correlated with angry FER but no other emotions. Social Prioritization had significant indirect effects on social impairments through angry FER.

Findings suggest interventions aimed at improving recognition of specific emotions may mitigate social impairments in SPBT. Further, reduced social attention (i.e., diminished face looking) could be a factor in reduced face processing ability, which may result in social impairments. Longitudinal research is needed to elucidate temporal associations between social attention, face processing, and social impairments.

The purpose of this research is to analyze the empirical evidence on the relationship between social cognition and prosocial behavior in children and adolescents with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). A systematic review was carried out following the PRISMA guidelines of empirical studies found in PubMed and Scopus databases, including a total of 51 research studies. The results indicate that children and adolescents with ADHD have deficits in social cognition and prosocial behavior. For children with ADHD, their deficits in social cognition highlight their difficulty in the process of theory of mind, emotional self-regulation, emotion recognition and empathy, affecting prosocial behavior, evidencing difficulty in personal relationships, and the creation of emotional bonds with their peers.

Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common disorders in school-age children. In addition to learning difficulties associated with the disorder's core symptoms of inattention and hyperactivity, children with ADHD display substantial social impairments. Methylphenidate (MPH) in formulations such as Ritalin or Concerta mitigates inattention and hyperactivity, but the effects of the therapy on social behavior in children with ADHD are not clear. This review aims to determine the effectiveness of short term (up to 6 months) MPH treatment on three domains of social skills in children aged 6-14 with ADHD: (i) Recognition of nonverbal emotional expressions, which are a marker of inherent (unlearned) social understanding, (ii) theory of mind (ToM) components that relate to learned cognition and social communication, and (iii) social competence in everyday environments. 15 relevant studies were identified based on inclusion/exclusion criteria. The results show mixed effects: the overall social performance as evaluated by parents, teachers or peers, and some components of ToM, were found to improve following a weeks-long course of MPH treatment. However, the effects of the medication are less clear when evaluating momentary/nonverbal social responses such as reactions to emotional facial expressions. While the findings of this review indicate that an MPH medication regime of order weeks to months could improve, to a degree, social impairment in children with ADHD, more studies are required to identify the medications' mechanism and confirm such a conclusion.

We tested whether empathy is impaired and associated with anxiety in girls with fragile X syndrome (FXS). We measured parent-reported empathy and self-reported anxiety in young girls with FXS and in a developmentally-matched comparison group. Girls with FXS received higher parent-reported scores on cognitive and affective empathy but also self-reported more severe anxiety symptoms, particularly separation anxiety and phobia symptoms, than girls in the comparison group. Girls with FXS who received higher cognitive empathy scores, however, appeared buffered against risk for separation anxiety and phobia symptoms. Girls with FXS experience elevated empathy and anxiety relative to their developmentally-matched peers. Higher cognitive empathy in girls with FXS may indicate resilience against specific forms of anxiety that are commonly observed in FXS.

In recent years, there has been growing interest in investigating the effect of specific pharmacological treatments for ADHD not only on its core symptoms, but also on social skills in youths. This stands especially true for ADHD patients displaying impulsive aggressiveness and antisocial behaviors, being the comorbidity with Disruptive Behavior Disorders, one of the most frequently observed in clinical settings. This systematic review aimed to synthesize research findings on this topic following PRISMA guidelines and to identify gaps in current knowledge, future directions, and treatment implications. Search strategies included the following terms: ADHD; methylphenidate and other ADHD drugs; empathy, theory of mind and emotion recognition. Full-text articles were retrieved and data from individual studies were collected. Thirteen studies were finally included in our systematic review. Ten studies assessing changes in empathy and/or theory of mind in patients with ADHD treated after pharmacological interventions were identified. Similarly, seven partially overlapping studies assessing changes in emotion recognition were retrieved. Despite a great heterogeneity in the methodological characteristics of the included studies, most of them reported an improvement in emphatic and theory of mind abilities in youths with ADHD treated with psychostimulants and nonstimulant drugs, as well as positive but less consistent results about emotion recognition performances.

Empathy has long been considered a multidimensional construct, encompassing cognitive, affective and behavioral domains. Deficits in empathic competences in early childhood contribute to psychopathology, and have been variably implicated in several clinical conditions, such as autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and conduct disorders.

To identify and describe empirically validated questionnaires assessing empathy in children and adolescents and to provide a summary of related theoretical perspectives on empathy definitional issues.

A systematic review of the literature was conducted. Three bibliographic databases were searched. A total of 47 studies were selected for final analysis and 16 distinct measures were identified and described.

Questionable to excellent levels of internal consistency were observed, while few studies assessed test-retest reliability. Although construct definitions only partially overlapped, affective and cognitive domains of empathy were the commonest internal factors that were often separately evaluated. New facets of the construct (i.e., somatic empathy and sympathy) and specific clinical populations (i.e., ASD) could be specifically addressed through more recent instruments.

The combination of different assessment methods is recommended in order to foresee further improvements in this field and try to overcome the problem of limited convergence with more objective measures.

Objective: Despite evidence of social skill deficits in children with ADHD, there is no consensus regarding a social cognitive profile and whether these skills predict behavior. Therefore, a comprehensive battery was used to investigate the relationship between social cognition and behavioral functioning. Method: Children ages 7 to 13 with ADHD (n = 25) and controls (n = 25) completed tests assessing social cognitive domains (affect recognition and theory of mind [ToM]). Parents completed measures of social cognition (pragmatic language ability and empathy), behavioral symptoms, and adaptive functioning. Results: Children with ADHD performed significantly worse on measures of cognitive ToM and affect recognition and received lower ratings of pragmatic language and cognitive empathy than typically developing peers. These domains, particularly pragmatic language, predicted parent ratings of problematic and adaptive behaviors. Conclusion: Results establish a relationship between specific social cognitive abilities and daily functioning, which has implications for treatment.

Empathy is defined as an emotional or cognitive response to another's emotional state. It is considered essential for navigating meaningful social interactions and is closely linked to prosocial behavior. Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is characterized by an impairment of motor coordination that has a marked impact on both academic and day-to-day living activities. Children and adolescents with DCD have been shown to have less developed social support and friendships. The research linking empathy and DCD is scarce. The aims of this study are to gain an understanding of the relationship between DCD and empathy in young adults with DCD only, and with DCD coupled with other neurodevelopmental disorders, in comparison with typically developing adults.

The study included 212 young adults aged 18-40 years. The subjects in this study were from mainstream populations in the UK. The study groups included: (a) "DCD only" with 42 individuals; (b) "DCD + ASD" with 21 individuals; (c) "DCD + ADHD" with 45 individuals; (d) "DCD + ASD + ADHD" with 29 individuals; and (e) the control group of 75 individuals.

ANOVA on the Empathy Questionnaire (EQ) showed a statistically significant difference between groups (F [4,257] = 35.63; p < 0.001; η_p² = 0.409). No significant differences were found between the DCD-only and the control. MANOVA was performed to assess differences in the Socialising and Friendship Questionnaire (SAF-Q) scores. The results showed a statistically significant difference between groups (F [8,257] = 9.98; p < 0.001; η = 0.162). Pearson correlation coefficients were performed, revealing significant high correlations between the EQ and the two parts of the SAF-Q ("past" and "currently").

The results of this study indicate that social difficulties in the DCD-only group are not due to lack of empathy, but may be driven by an accumulation of external factors. In this study we also concluded that DCD does not appear to be the factor that reduces the ability to empathize, but rather the presence of ADHD and/or ASD.

This review focuses on facial recognition abilities in children and adolescents with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). A systematic review, using PRISMA guidelines, was conducted to identify original articles published prior to May 2017 pertaining to memory, face recognition, affect recognition, facial expression recognition and recall of faces in children and adolescents with ADHD. The qualitative synthesis based on different studies shows a particular focus of the research on facial affect recognition without paying similar attention to the structural encoding of facial recognition. In this review, we further investigate facial recognition abilities in children and adolescents with ADHD, providing synthesis of the results observed in the literature, while detecting face recognition tasks used on face processing abilities in ADHD and identifying aspects not yet explored.

Problems in inhibitory control are regarded in Psychology as a key problem associated with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). They, however, might not be primary deficits, but instead a consequence of inattention. At least two components have been identified and dissociated in studies in regards to inhibitory control: interference suppression, responsible for controlling interference by resisting irrelevant or misleading information, and response inhibition, referring to withholding a response or overriding an ongoing behavior. Poor error awareness and self-monitoring undermine an individual's ability to inhibit inadequate responses and change course of action. In non-social contexts, an individual depends on his own cognition to regulate his mistakes. In social contexts, however, there are many social cues that should help that individual to perceive his mistakes and inhibit inadequate responses. The processes involved in perceiving and interpreting those social cues are arguably part of a self-protection system (SPS). Individuals with ADHD not only present impulsive behaviors in social contexts, but also have difficulty perceiving their inadequate responses and overriding ongoing actions toward more appropriate ones. In this paper, we discuss that those difficulties are arguably a consequence of an impaired SPS, due to visual attention deficits and subsequent failure in perceiving and recognizing accurately negative emotions in facial expressions, especially anger. We discuss evidence that children with ADHD exhibit problems in a series of components involved in the activation of that system and advocate that the inability to identify the anger expressed by others, and thus, not experiencing the fear response that should follow, is, ultimately, what prevents them from inhibiting the ongoing inappropriate behavior, since a potential threat is not registered. Getting involved in high-risk situations, such as reckless driving, could also be a consequence of not registering a threat and thus, not experiencing fear.