The Evolutionary Role of ADHD in Prehistoric Humans: A Trait Adapted to Foraging, Now Misaligned with Modern Life, by Kambiz Kamrani (also here.)
For most of human history, Homo sapiens lived as hunter-gatherers. Fossil evidence indicates that our species has existed in this mode of life for at least 288,000 years, which accounts for approximately 95% of our evolutionary history. During this time, the ability to rapidly shift focus, seek new stimuli, and make quick decisions could have been highly advantageous.
Evolutionary mismatch ideas are fun, and even if they are sometimes overdone and turn into just-so stories, they have a lot of value. We look at frustrating traits, in ourselves and others, in a kinder light. There is a fair bit of speculation here, but not unwarranted. It does make a certain amount of superficial sense, and may turn out to be largely true. Kamrani puts a little time into describing what might be done for modern adaptations, which is also valuable.
Tangent: I am coming up on Post 10,000 but still don't know what I am going to do.
When I first began learning about ADHD (I have it, as do many of my children), articles and papers like these felt like they were shining a useful light on something I was desperate to understand.
ReplyDeleteToday, I'm far more skeptical. No matter how good a story they tell, I seldom see any reason to think that it's not just an elaborate post-hoc rationalization.
Nice segue to the tangent.
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