r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 16d ago

Neuroscience ADHD misinformation on TikTok is shaping young adults’ perceptions. An analysis of the 100 most-viewed TikTok videos related to ADHD revealed that fewer than half the claims about symptoms actually align with clinical guidelines for diagnosing ADHD.

https://news.ubc.ca/2025/03/adhd-misinformation-on-tiktok/
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u/DTFH_ 16d ago

when I say there are videos of people saying "you know you have adhd when you inhale and then exhale". Stuff that is relatable to everyone.

While true I want to clarify that the common mental health disorders to not give you unique experiences or unique behaviors that exist as diagnostic criteria, often it is about the intensity, duration and situational appropriateness of a behaviors or actions that impacts your health, livelihood and relationships.

For example inattentiveness is a normal human experience, having to use the restroom and holding it a little too long for whatever laundry list of valid reasons (traffic, no stalls, middle of talking to someone, etc) is normal but if it occurs often enough for such duration that you routinely experienced physical distress symptoms then its something to look at and is distinct from the happenstance inattentiveness of ignoring a bodily signal.

Peeing in a bottle because you're too drunk after a fun night out to walk to the bathroom and the next day you're found with a bottle of piss in your room, in the realm of normality, hoarding bottles of piss in your room that you are unwilling to throw out, is a different story, but they are the same actions and behaviors which is why a professional uses their discernment developed by their years of training to diagnosis clinical significance.

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u/Tangata_Tunguska 16d ago

100%. And it gets even more complex in that modern life can really push the limits of what is "normal". I've had a few people come in to clinic wanting a referral for an ADHD assessment, and their main difficulty is they can't concentrate on their extremely monotonous computer based work for 8 hours a day.