Regional Dysregulation and Aberrant Functional Connectivity in ADHD

The trajectory of neurodevelopmental adversity determining attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) from childhood to adulthood which is recognized increasingly by the long-term impairment and the burgeoning persistence beyond childhood, through adolescence, to adulthood poses a prolonged history defined by a concatenation of symptom profiles and an underlying dysregulation accompanied by aberrant brain regional networks. Abnormalities within the “default mode network” and disharmonizing fluctuations afflicting brain regional connectivity, even inducing dysconnectivity, appear to be associated both with symptoms profiles and the relative efficacy of putative interventional outcomes. Co-morbidity in ADHD, a persistently debilitating and potentially regressive issue, is viewed from a perspective of eating disorders and substance use disorders although several other combinations proliferate. Among the factors contributing to dysregulation and aberrant connectivity in brain development are included genetic and epigenetic proclivities, neurotoxins and neurodegeneration, predisposing characteristics and environmental pressures. Finally, the likelihood of perinatal stress trauma and/or inflammation as contributory circumstances ought to be considered.