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Researchers compared 23 children diagnosed with ADHD with 33 without the condition and found clear differences in both performance and the underlying brain signal.
By Shula Rosen
Jerusalem-based researchers say they have identified a simple brainwave “signature” that helped distinguish children with ADHD from their peers — and, in a small trial, the signal shifted after a short, drug-free intervention aimed at improving attention and self-control.
The study, led by scientists at the Hebrew University in collaboration with partners abroad and published in NeuroImage, followed children ages 6 to 12 as they completed a computer task designed to measure focus and impulse control while wearing an EEG cap that records brain activity.
Researchers compared 23 children diagnosed with ADHD with 33 children without the condition and found clear differences in both performance and the underlying brain signal.
Children with ADHD tended to respond more slowly and made more mistakes that suggested difficulty stopping themselves from pressing the button at the wrong time, the researchers reported.
But the most consistent distinction, the team said, came from a background pattern in the EEG — a kind of ongoing “noise” in the brain’s electrical activity that is usually not the headline measure in ADHD research.
In a second phase, the researchers tested whether that signal could change. The children with ADHD were split into two groups in a randomized, sham-controlled trial: One group received a two-week program combining cognitive exercises with gentle, noninvasive electrical stimulation, while the other received the same training with a sham version of the stimulation.
The team reported that children who received the active intervention showed a measurable shift in the brain signal compared with the sham group, along with improvements in some measures of task performance. Some of the brain changes were still present three weeks after the sessions ended, suggesting the effect was not purely immediate.
The researchers said the findings matter because ADHD is typically diagnosed and monitored mainly through behavior reports from parents, teachers and clinicians, which can vary by setting and are not always consistent. An objective measure taken directly from brain activity, they argued, could eventually help clinicians confirm diagnoses, track whether treatment is working and tailor care to individual children.
The researchers cautioned that the trial was small and said larger studies are needed. Still, they described the results as a step toward adding an objective tool to ADHD care — and toward expanding non-drug options for families looking for alternatives.
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