Cited by 340Attention Deficit Hyperactivity DisorderChild and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional DevelopmentAutism Spectrum Disorder Research

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 70 of the 71 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; none of the 55 sources its claims cite is checked for support yet.

Subtyping Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Using Temperament Dimensions: Toward Biologically Based Nosologic Criteria

Open access

Abstract

IMPORTANCE: Psychiatric nosology is limited by behavioral and biological heterogeneity within existing disorder categories. The imprecise nature of current nosologic distinctions limits both mechanistic understanding and clinical prediction. We demonstrate an approach consistent with the National Institute of Mental Health Research Domain Criteria initiative to identify superior, neurobiologically valid subgroups with better predictive capacity than existing psychiatric categories for childhood attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). OBJECTIVE: To refine subtyping of childhood ADHD by using biologically based behavioral dimensions (i.e., temperament), novel classification algorithms, and multiple external validators. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: A total of 437 clinically well-characterized, community-recruited children, with and without ADHD, participated in an ongoing longitudinal study. Baseline data were used to classify children into subgroups based on temperament dimensions and examine external validators including physiological and magnetic resonance imaging measures. One-year longitudinal follow-up data are reported for a subgroup of the ADHD sample to address stability and clinical prediction. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Parent/guardian ratings of children on a measure of temperament were used as input features in novel community detection analyses to identify subgroups within the sample. Groups were validated using 3 widely accepted external validators: peripheral physiological characteristics (cardiac measures of respiratory sinus arrhythmia and pre-ejection period), central nervous system functioning (via resting-state functional connectivity magnetic resonance imaging), and clinical outcomes (at 1-year longitudinal follow-up). RESULTS: The community detection algorithm suggested 3 novel types of ADHD, labeled as mild (normative emotion regulation), surgent (extreme levels of positive approach-motivation), and irritable (extreme levels of negative emotionality, anger, and poor soothability). Types were independent of existing clinical demarcations including DSM-5 presentations or symptom severity. These types showed stability over time and were distinguished by unique patterns of cardiac physiological response, resting-state functional brain connectivity, and clinical outcomes 1 year later. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Results suggest that a biologically informed temperament-based typology, developed with a discovery-based community detection algorithm, provides a superior description of heterogeneity in the ADHD population than does any current clinical nosologic criteria. This demonstration sets the stage for more aggressive attempts at a tractable, biologically based nosology.

Overview

AI snapshot

Written from the paper’s full text.

TL;DR

This study used parent-rated temperament and community detection to identify three ADHD subgroups—Mild, Surgent, and Irritable—that cut across DSM-5 presentations. The subgroups showed distinct peripheral physiology, amygdala resting-state connectivity, one-year stability, and prediction of new comorbid disorders.

Key findings

  • Among 247 children with ADHD, community detection produced three temperament-based types: Mild (n=64, 25.9%), Surgent (n=85, 34.4%), and Irritable (n=98, 39.7%), with strong separation (Q=.50); these types did not map onto DSM-5 ADHD presentations.
  • Surgent children had shorter tonic pre-ejection period than controls and the other ADHD types (baseline F[1,305]=2.73, p=.044; task F[3,303]=3.95, p=.009), while Irritable children showed a smaller respiratory sinus arrhythmia increase during negative emotion conditions, and Surgent children showed respiratory sinus arrhythmia withdrawal during positive conditions.
  • Amygdala connectivity differed by type: Irritable children had weaker amygdala–anterior insula connectivity than all other groups, Mild children had reduced posterior cingulate/precuneus connectivity, and Surgent children had increased amygdala–cingulate/precuneus connectivity relative to Mild and Irritable children.
  • At one-year follow-up, types were more stable than chance (χ²[4]=71.84, p<.001); over 70% of Surgent and Irritable children stayed in the same type, whereas only 43.6% of Mild children did. Irritable children had more new comorbid disorder onsets (39.5%) than controls (11.1%), Mild (18.2%), or Surgent (11.1%) children, and temperament type predicted comorbidity onset (p=.019, OR=2.46) while DSM-5 presentation and ODD symptoms did not uniquely predict it.

Methods

  • Longitudinal community-recruited sample of 437 children ages 7–11: 190 controls (46.3% male) and 247 with ADHD (71.6% male). Parent/guardian ratings on the Temperament in Middle Childhood Questionnaire provided 16 subscales used as clustering features.
  • Community detection used a weight-conserving modularity algorithm on child-by-child correlations; final assignments were based on the modal group across 10 runs, with Variation of Information used to assess robustness.
  • External validation included peripheral physiology (respiratory sinus arrhythmia and pre-ejection period) during emotion tasks for 178 ADHD and 128 control children, resting-state functional connectivity MRI with an amygdala seed for 39 ADHD children (18 Mild, 11 Surgent, 10 Irritable) and 15 controls, and one-year follow-up for 101 children with ADHD. Analyses included repeated-measures ANOVAs, connectivity t-tests with Monte Carlo correction, and logistic/multinomial regression.

Limitations

  • The paper states that imaging results come from a small subsample and should be considered preliminary; it also notes known limitations of parent-report measures and calls for future work on family history, genetics, replication in other samples, and treatment response.
  • The paper states that the Mild type was less well validated because it showed normative peripheral physiology and was not particularly stable over time.
  • Evident from the text: community detection is nondeterministic, so the authors relied on modal assignments across 10 runs; the follow-up sample was only 101 children with ADHD, and the MRI subsample was small, limiting confidence in neural findings.

Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2014.763This paper is marked retracted.

Cites

70 of 70 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

48 Own result · 28 Not checked yet · 20 Own interpretation · 7 Own method · 2 No basis given

Verify all 55 references — free account

Show all 66 claims

  • It may state two separate claims as one. 28
  • The quote only partly states this claim. 1
  • Probably not a substantial claim. 15
39 of 39
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    No prior study of alternative nosology has demonstrated both biological validity and clinical prediction within the same sample.

    “For example, no study of alternative nosology has demonstrated both biological validity and clinical prediction within the same sample.”
  • The authors state this as an assumption.

    The TMCQ subscales and higher order factors are influenced by underlying neurobehavioral systems.

    “Items form 16 subscales and three higher order factors that are hypothesized to be influenced by underlying neurobehavioral systems.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The 247 children with ADHD in this community-recruited sample are representative of the broader ADHD population.

    “Data are reported for 437 children: NControl=190 (46.3% male); NADHD=247 (71.6% male) between the ages of 7–11. Participants were drawn from the Oregon ADHD Program, a child cohort for which the community-based recruitment and enrollment procedures and multi-informant assessment procedures for ADHD diagnosis are published elsewhere [31–33] and described in the Supplement.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The one-year follow-up period is sufficient to assess stability and clinical prediction.

    “One-year longitudinal follow-up data on clinical features and TMCQ ratings are reported for 101 children with ADHD (98% of those currently due for follow up in this ongoing study).”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Parent-report on the TMCQ broadly captures RDoC domains of negative valence systems, positive valence systems/approach motivation, and cognitive control.

    “parent-report on the TMCQ broadly captures RDoC domains of negative valence systems, positive valence systems/approach motivation, and cognitive control”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The insula is important for monitoring and adjusting sympathetic and parasympathetic tone.

    “the insula is a region that has been long known to be important for monitoring and adjusting sympathetic and parasympathetic tone”
6 of 6

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

Each contradiction between two passages listed here was confirmed by an independent check.

2 of 2

Citations

Cites

Show all 71 references

Research works printed but not linked: 5

  1. [15]Bates JE Goodnight JA Fite JE Lewis M Haviland-Jones JM Barrett LF Temperament and Emotion, in Handbook of Emotion 2008 New York, NY The Guilford Press
  2. [20]Zuckerman M Psychobiology of personality 2005 2nd ed. New York, NY Cambridge University Press
  3. [34]Simonds J Rothbart MK The Temperament in Middle Childhood Questionnaire (TMCQ): A computerized self-report measure of temperament for ages 7–10, in Occasional Temperament Conference 2004 Athens, GA
  4. [50]Patenaude B Smith S Kennedy D Jenkinson M FIRST-FMRIB’s integrated registration and segmentation tool Human Brain Mapping Conference 2007
  5. [55]Keppel G Review of Statistical Analysis in Psychology and Education PsycCRITIQUES 1981 26 9 5th ed. 723 723

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Metadata

Authors
Karalunas, S. L., Fair, D., Musser, E. D., Aykes, K., Iyer, S. P., & Nigg, J. T.
Affiliations
  • Oregon Health & Science University (US)
  • Florida International University (US)
  • Brigham and Women's Hospital (US)
Corresponding author
Karalunas, Sarah L.
Venue
JAMA Psychiatry
Published
2014-09-01
Volume
71
Issue
9
Pages
1015
ISSN
2168-622X (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W1983915852
Cited by
340
References
71
Citations by year
2026: 16 · 2025: 15 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 29 · 2021: 37 · 2020: 39 · 2019: 37 · 2018: 26 · 2017: 41 · 2016: 32 · 2015: 29 · 2014: 4
FWCI
26.96
Type
journal article
Language
en
Status
Retracted
Open access
Locations
  • JAMA Psychiatry (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • National Institutes of Health (5r01mh099064-05)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (R01-MH099064, R01MH115357, F32MH098632, R00MH091238, R37MH059105, R01MH096773, R01MH059105, R01MH086654)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
Keywords
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, childhood ADHD, temperament dimensions, Research Domain Criteria, community detection, emotion regulation, approach motivation, negative affectivity, pre-ejection period, resting-state functional connectivity, disease classification, clinical prediction, longitudinal stability
MeSH terms
Algorithms, Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity, Brain, Child, Electrocardiography, Female, Heart Rate, Humans, Longitudinal Studies, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Surveys and Questionnaires, Temperament, Case-Control Studies, Functional Neuroimaging, Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-10-06, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).

A second model labelled each claim on 2026-10-06 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review