ABSTRACT
Awareness by mental health professionals and the lay public of attentiondeficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and its impact on functioning in childhood and adulthood has grown rapidly since 1990. This is reflected in the proliferation of self-help books (1-3), documentaries, and television programming (4,5), and an exponential increase in the prescription of psychostimulants (6). These developments have been controversial, as the validity of the diagnosis, particularly in adults, has been questioned (7,8).
