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ADHD Justice Support Center » Facts & Figures

Facts & Figures

The generally quoted incidence of ADHD among adults in the U.S. is about 4.4%. 1

Research by Robert Eme and Patrick Hurley has suggested the very conservative incidence of ADHD in the adult offender population to be 25%. This study found that incidences of ADHD in correctional facilities ranged from 22% to over 50%. 2

Russ Barkley’s study of U.S. youth, matched for socioeconomic status and followed for 10 years, found that:

      • 20% of the control group was arrested compared to 48% of the AD/HD group.
      • The control group arrested on average 2.1 times, compared to 6.4 times for the AD/HD group. 3

Studies have found that inmates with mental illness stay in the system over 5X longer than those without. 4

Studies have found that New York’s Riker’s Island, Chicago’s Cook County Jail and the Los Angeles County Jail are the largest mental health institutions in the nation. 5

Adults with ADHD engage in more high-risk behavrios and have a higher rate of substance abuse, more injuries, and more car accidents than non-ADHD adults. 6

65-70% of ADHD cases coexist with another condition or learning disability. 7

Individuals with ADHD have a 50% greater incidence of substance abuse. In cases where ADHD coexists with Conduct Disorder (CD), this number triples. 8

ADHD is highly inheritable. There is a 75% chance a person with ADHD inherited those genes from at least one of his or her parents. 9

50-67% of children with ADHD retain symptoms into adulthood. 10

Adults with ADHD are less likely to be employed- 24% employment for ADHD adults, 79% employment for adults without ADHD. Employment rate improves with medication treatment. 11

 Adults with ADHD have a significantly lower socioeconomic status, a lower level of academic achievement, and higher medical costs than their peers. 12

Notes:

  1. Kessler et al.,”Lifetime prevalence and age-of-onset distributions of DSM-IV disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication,” Arch Gen Psychiatry, 2005 Jun;62(6):593-602 ↩
  2. Robert Eme, PhD and Patrick Hurley, Spinning Out of Control, 2009 (2nd Edition) ↩
  3. Russell A. Barkley, PhD et al. ADHD in Adults, What Science Says. 2008 (4th Edition) Guilford Press p. 205 ↩
  4. Fox Butterfield, “Prisons Replace Hospitals for the Nation’s Mentally Ill,” New York Times, March 5, 1998. ↩
  5. E. Fuller Torrey, “Reinventing Mental Health Care,” City Journal 9:4, Autumn 1999. ↩
  6. Breyer et al. 2009; Sabuncuoglu 2007, Wilens and Upadhyaya 2007 ↩
  7. Margaret Austen et al., “ADHD Comorbidity,” MentalHelp.net, Nov. 5th 2007, Jan. 18 2013, <http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=13851> ↩
  8. Caroline Helwick, “Combination of Conduct Disorder and ADHD Predictive of Substance Abuse,” Medscape, Jun. 1 2010, Jan. 18, 2013, <http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/722740> ↩
  9. M.G.H. Rietveld et al, “Heritability of attention problems in children: longitudinal results from a study of twins, age 3 to 12,”  Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, March 2004, Volume 45, Issue 3, pages 577–588 ↩
  10. Wilens 2004; Barkley et a. 2002 ↩
  11. Halmey et al. 2009 ↩
  12. Kleinman et al. 2009; Bernfort et al. 2008 ↩